The end of Flash for mobile?

From 15 August 2012, Adobe have pulled the Flash Player from Android's Google Play market. Does this spell a sad end of Flash on mobile devices? Don't cry Mr Android... there is always HTML5 to perk you up!

From 15 August 2012, Adobe, developers of Flash and the Flash Player plugin, have pulled Flash Player from Android's Google Play market. Newer Android operating systems will no longer be able to download the plugin. Existing installations will remain on devices until users remove it.

Apple famously does not allow the Flash Player plugin on any of the Apple mobile devices, including iPhone and iPad. Now, Adobe has stopped development and support for mobile versions of the plugin for the Android market.

This really cements the fact that Flash is a dying aspect of web development, and although we cannot stop using it while users are on older browsers, it seems HTML5 is going to be the future of multimedia on the internet.

HTML5 video, audio, canvas and more will all be used to good effect to replace multimedia that has traditionally been developed using the costly software developed by Adobe.

However, Adobe will continue to support Flash on PC browsing and mobile applications developed with Flash and packaged with Adobe AIR.

About the Author

Karl Tynan avatar

Karl Tynan, Senior Front End Developer

Karl is our Senior Front End Developer, looking after our HTML, CSS and JavaScript. He is also a keen Umbraco developer, regularly contributing to the local Umbraco meetups at umBristol.