Google’s Android 15 statue is pretty ‘vanilla’

Internally, Android releases are still codenamed after desserts, and the Android 15 statue reflects that “Vanilla Ice Cream” nature.

Dave Burke, who no longer leads Android engineering, shared a picture of the new statue in Mountain View, California. It features The Bot, as the 3D mascot is officially known as, sitting on a park bench holding a waffle cone of vanilla ice cream (with sprinkles). The character is wearing a red and white t-shirt with a stripped breast pocket and sleeves.

There is an inscription on the bench, which is only accessible to Googlers compared to the previous statue garden, though you’ll still find some large-scale Android figurines scattered around the campus.

The Android 15 statue has a more interesting (and practical) design than last year’s upside down mascot, though the swing for Android 13 was definitely cooler. With the annual statues, Google is preserving the whimsy around Android releases.

The Android 15 update for Google Pixel is not expected to arrive until next month. The biggest feature is Private Space, while there are some smaller tweaks to the interface that users will notice. Otherwise, it’s not a significant release, with the codename more or less reflecting that.