In addition to the many security fixes, the latest version of Android 8.1 includes many features that developers can use to enhance the experience of your smartphone.
Android 8.1 doesn't seem to be that great for most end users. The major improvements for end users brought to Android by 2017 came with Android 8.0. 
But for developers or 8.1 version it was very impressive:
Visual core or Android 8.1 Visual Core
The Visual Core is the first processor specifically designed by Google. It is a special chip for image processing. Today it is only released in the new Pixel 2 and Pixel 2 XL, but we can see it on other smartphones.
Android 8.1 has activated the Visual Core chip and the results are impressive. The Operator handles High-Dynamic Range (HDR) pictures much faster. It can take a series of photos in microseconds, and HDR cameras do a much better job than older digital cameras.
With Google's HDR + technology, your smartphone camera and the Visual Core chip, the photos are processed five times faster than the previous generation of processors with superior quality. You may not notice the speed, but you will surely notice more detail in your photos, especially in low-light photos.
You used HDR + photos once using Google's photo app. Now even third-party apps will be able to use the Android Camera (API) to take advantage of superior processing for better photos.
Nervous network API
Any device that can upgrade to Android 8.1 (currently only Pixel 2 and 2 XL, Pixel 1 and 1 XL, Pixel C and Nexus 6P and 5X) can use APN Neural Networks (NNAPI ). As an end user, you will not notice anything from this improvement, but Android developers will surely notice it. NNAPI is designed to allow mechanical learning (ML) on mobile devices. This API provides a base layer, a higher-level, and ML framework that can be used by Google's TensorFlow Lite.
What does this mean to you as a user? you can expect to see some very interesting smart applications coming soon. For example, next year, you can expect speech recognition and language translation applications that will approach Star Trek levels.
Bluetooth battery level measurements
Tired of not knowing whether the headphones or a Bluetooth device is empty? I know I do it. With Android 8.1, you will find a Bluetooth device battery display in Bluetooth settings. It would have been better to have existed in the top line.
Better screen management
On some smartphones, and specifically on the Pixel 2 XL, the screen had problems that eventually burned it out. Screen burn can be done when the same screen elements (such as navigation icons or the clock) are always on. After a while, these items "burn" on the screen, so if you try to close they remain open.
Android 8.1 came up with the end of the burn-up.
New look
There are no major changes to the look, but there are some that are very useful, such as the Pixel Starter or the Pixel Launcher. The feature makes it easier than ever to access Google search features and installed applications. Android's fast settings are now more transparent so you can see every change of the main screen.
The all-in-all Android 8.1 seems to be a huge step forward and we are looking forward to seeing it in more smartphones.
We should also mention Google's Project Treble that has been redesigned to make it easier for device manufacturers to instantly update their devices to new versions of Android.
Let's see…
