Tap once to toggle Wi‑Fi used to be as natural as breathing on Android. Then Android 12 bundled Wi‑Fi and mobile data into a single "Internet" tile, and simple actions suddenly required an extra tap or two. Now, after poring over the Android Open Source Project, developers have found code that suggests Google is quietly preparing to undo that change.
What changed and why it mattered
Before Android 12, Quick Settings showed separate tiles for Wi‑Fi and mobile data. The change to a single Internet panel was deliberate: Google wanted to reduce accidental data usage by making it easier to switch the active connection without turning Wi‑Fi fully off. It made sense from a safety and simplicity perspective — but not everyone agreed. Power users and people who flip radios frequently complained that a one‑tap action had become a multi‑step chore.
Workarounds existed. Third‑party apps and ADB hacks gave back one‑tap toggles for a while, but those methods have broken across Android updates and often require elevated privileges. Which left many users stuck with the slower Internet panel or with OEM skins that never bothered to adopt Google’s change.
What the code reveals
The clue came in the Android 16 QPR2 source release. Michael Bestas, a LineageOS lead, spotted commits that add separate Quick Settings tiles: one labeled Mobile Data and a new Wi‑focused tile (temporarily still called Internet to ease migration). The changes include user‑facing strings and a feature flag named com.android.systemui.qssplitinternet_tile described as splitting the Internet tile into Wi‑Fi and Mobile Data.
According to the code, the Mobile Data tile will toggle cellular data directly and prompt a confirmation dialog when tapped. The Wi‑Fi tile adds pause and scan controls and will display the current non‑Wi‑Fi provider when Wi‑Fi is not active — a nod to keeping users informed as the system drifts away from the original Provider Model.
For now this is behind a flag and not enabled in public QPR3 Beta or Android Canary builds, so it may never reach stable builds exactly as written. But the presence of these commits shows Google is at least experimenting with a split.
Why this matters beyond convenience
A quick toggle is a small thing, but small things ripple. One‑tap switches speed up common workflows — flipping Wi‑Fi off on a flaky network, pausing Wi‑Fi while troubleshooting, or cutting cellular quickly to save battery. They also matter for automation and enterprise device management where admins or apps expect predictable, rapid control over radios.
A split tile could benefit developers too. More granular tiles mean clearer system signals for apps that monitor connectivity or trigger actions when radios change state. And because many OEMs never fully embraced the Internet panel, restoring separate tiles would reduce fragmentation: stock Android acting more like what many users already get on custom skins.
There are also privacy and multi‑user considerations. Google has been experimenting with more nuanced Wi‑Fi sharing and controls for shared devices; this work sits alongside those efforts and signals a broader rethinking of connectivity UX. It is the same experimental spirit that shows up in other Android tests, like the floating controls Google has tried for Search Live floating controls for Search Live on Android.
Expect a slow, cautious rollout — if it comes at all
This isn’t a sudden reversal so much as a careful trial. The split is handled behind a feature flag and the Wi‑Fi tile keeps the Internet name at first to smooth the change. That suggests Google wants the option to flip it on for partners, OEMs, or beta testers and to gather usage data before making any broad decision.
Even if the flag makes it into a Pixel beta, timelines are unpredictable. Google could fold the work into a future Android 16 quarterly update, reserve it for OEMs, or rework the idea entirely. Until the flag is enabled in public builds, users should treat this as a promising hint rather than a finished feature.
If you care about fast access to radios, keep an eye on the next Android betas. The return of one‑tap Wi‑Fi and mobile data would be a small user experience correction, but a welcome one after years of extra taps and third‑party workarounds. And it would join other recent Android experiments — from connectivity tweaks to new interaction models — that quietly reshape how the OS feels day to day, including work that ties into Google’s navigation and assistant efforts Google Maps’s Gemini copilot for navigation.
No drama yet, just code and a feature flag. But sometimes software forks back toward what users actually reach for: the simplest, fastest tap.