14 DAY TRIAL // Good news for HTC One max owners who have purchased their phablets through Verizon's official retail channels, as the Taiwanese handset maker has announced that the highly anticipated Android 4.4.2 KitKat update will start rolling next week.
HTC's Executive Director Mohammed Versi has confirmed that HTC One max at Verizon should start receiving the said upgrade beginning April 7. According to him, the carrier should kick off the rollout of the update in the afternoon, so if you own the One max, that's the time you would want to check for the major upgrade on your handset.
“HTC Verizon One Max Owners! We have received technical approval for Sense 5.5 + OS 4.4.2! Expect the OTA update to start on Monday afternoon.”
HTC One max was launched back in October with Android 4.3 Jelly Bean operating system out of the box and HTC Sense 5.5 UI on top.
The newest version of HTC's proprietary UI, Sense 6.0, has been confirmed to arrive for some high-end HTC smartphones in the coming months, so One max owners should not remain stuck on Sense 5.5 for too long.
Although Verizon has yet to publish the official changelog for this update, we know that Android 4.4.2 KitKat should bring some important under the hood improvements, such as better battery life and the option to turn off BlinkFeed.
In addition, some of the application now included in HTC One max's software will receive an update, such as Camera and Gallery apps. We will be back with more details regarding all the changes included in this update, as soon as Verizon posts the changelog on its support site.
We can safely assume that the update will be pushed OTA (over the air) in stages, so not all HTC One max owners might receive it at the same time. However, the KitKat upgrade should continue to roll out to One max devices throughout the next week until it reaches all devices.
Verizon is not the first carrier in the United States to offer the Android 4.4.2 KitKat update for HTC One max. Sprint kicked off the rollout of the upgrade last week and its customers who own the device should now be on KitKat already.
The international version of HTC One max has also received the update for quite some time now, so Verizon owners are actually among the last to get the upgrade. Still, better late than never. Stay tuned for more details on the changes included in KitKat for HTC One max.