Android M is now official and it's all about the user experience

Since you may want to revoke a permission from an app at a later time, you'll be able to do so through a menu in the settings, which will let you to control whether all or select apps have access to a certain category of permissions.

Google Now is better than ever

One of the biggest improvements in Android M actually have to do with Google Now — the search giant's digital assistant. The service is arguably already best-in-class, but thankfully, Google isn't being complacent.

Dubbed as 'Now on tap', the service will now be able to understand your context much better than before, including the app you're using and the content that you're exposed to. This will allow Google's assistant to do some pretty smart stuff. For example, a message received in Viber that references a chore (pick up the dry cleaning!) and a suggestion to maybe go to a restaurant will mean a ton to Google Now — a tap of the Home button will summon the service, which will offer to set a reminder for your dry cleaning, and whip out reviews and suggest apps that will let you reserve a table at that one restaurant.

This kind of functionality isn't just limited to Viber, though. If you're listening to a track, and activate Google Now and ask questions about the artist behind it, the assistant will know who you're talking about automatically. Another example is Chrome — just highlight the name of that one movie star, long-press the Home button to summon Google Now, and watch as it serves you all kinds of information about him or her. Best of all? None of the apps in question will need to be updated for Google Now to do its thing.

Another major announcement has to do with a new service alike to Apple Pay. Called Android Pay, it's Google's reboot of Wallet, allowing for mobile payments within stores. As you can imagine, it'll use NFC to communicate with terminals. 

On top of mobile payments, Android M is also introducing native support for fingerprint scanners, so manufacturers will no longer have to bake in support themselves — at least unless they want to. Coupled with Android Pay, it's obvious that Google is getting really serious about mobile payments.

If you're big on reading through Facebook, you will likely have noticed that the app no longer sends you off to do your thing with the help of a third-party browser, and any given article is instead served within Facebook. This very same type of functionality is coming to apps (Pinterest already confirmed), allowing third-party developers to bake in such functionality within their products. The heavy-lifting will be done with Chrome, though the interface will remain consistent with the app's design. 

Why you should care? Because this implementation will allow apps to pre-fetch content before you even open it, so load times will be lower than ever.

Seeing how battery life continues to be an overarching issue with smartphones, it only makes sense that a major update such as Android M will focus on this aspect of the experience as well. With M, Google is introducing 'dozing', a special mode that will only activate when your device's various sensors determine that your device is not being used (say, it's just standing on your desk), and enter an even deeper state of sleep. Thankfully, dozing won't stop your alarms and priority notifications from reaching you.

The results? Google claims that an identical setup with Android M manages up to x2 the standby time of a device on Android Lollipop. If true, dozing truly is a big deal.

On a related note, Google has made its support for USB Type C charging ports public, meaning that we can expect more such devices to creep up on us rather soon. The end of failed attempts at connecting your device is in sight, people!