Winlator: Windows game emulator development resumes after brief hiatus

Winlator is among the most popular Windows game emulators for Android. With a large community behind it, the emulator has reached to a state where it can run many old AAA games. Of course, to get a smooth emulation experience, an upper-mid to high-end phone with a physical mobile controller is often recommended (8Bitdo Ultimate smartphone controller curr. $39.50 on Amazon). However, it's worth noting that the emulator has wide compatibility, and the on-screen controls are functional as well.

Nonetheless, while the development of this Windows emulator for Android was going at a steady pace, back in late April 2025, the app's developer, BrunoSX, announced a sudden pause. It was mostly due to the attacks that the developer was facing because the app allegedly had malware and viruses.

In the announcement, BrunoSX claimed that all the releases of Winlator were apparently clean, and the developer had also pushed a hotfix before announcing the sudden break. Per some of the members of the subreddit, this hotfix removed the "false positive" virus, but according to the dev, many users were making the continuation of the development challenging.

The good news is that the announcement about the development pause has just been removed from Winlator's GitHub repository. This update to the readme file suggests that BrunoSX has returned from the brief hiatus. While the app hasn't been updated since the last announcement, given the change, it's possible that a new version is on the horizon.

As for the community's reaction to this change, most are positive about the matter and are hopeful about future developments. Some are, of course, still concerned about Winlator's past virus flags. It's possible that BrunoSX will address these concerns with future releases of the Windows emulator.