Adobe Air comes to x86 Android

Adobe Air is loved by some developers, but many users hate it. While the runtime works well for many developers and allows easy porting of apps, many people dislike having to install it just to make a handful of apps run. Plus, many simply don't like Adobe as a company. I can understand the company's detractors. After all, much of the company's software is arguably bloated and constantly exploited, causing numerous security updates. Steve Jobs chided Adobe Flash for poor performance, and actually banned it from the popular iOS operating system. Oh, and the information of 2.9 million customers was stolen.

With all of that said, Adobe makes some great products, such as Photoshop and Premier. Quite frankly, Air is pretty good too, despite what naysayers say. Today, Adobe announces that Air is coming to x86 Android, joining the already supported ARM architecture.

"During the last few months, several device manufacturers have released Intel Atom based mobile phones and tablets. Momentum has been developing in the market for x86-based Android tablets, and with Intel committing that there will be 40 million tablets shipping by the end of the 2014, we knew the time was right to deliver native AIR support", says Romil Mittal, Adobe.

Mittal further explains, "we are very excited to announce support for packaging of AIR applications for Intel x86 based Android devices. This support will allow AIR developers to directly target the x86 Android platform, providing the best performance possible from their AIR applications. With this new support, developers will be able to package their applications in both shared and captive modes. The AIR Runtime application with x86 support will be published on the Google Play Store, and will receive regular updates in sync with our other supported platforms".

This is big news for developers that utilize Adobe Air, but it is even bigger news for Intel. You see, the company has been working hard to crack the ARM-only Android market and this signals that it is starting to pay off. In other words, Adobe wouldn't bother unless it made financial sense.

Believe it or not, there are over 50,000 Adobe Air-based apps between iOS and Android. Now, those develops can target Intel-powered Android devices too. I recently reviewed the Acer A1-830 and came away impressed.

Do you own any x86-based Android devices? Tell me in the comments.