14 DAY TRIAL // Before the Google’s I/O 2015 conference, a report came in saying that Google had plans to announce a new update policy for Nexus devices.
While this didn’t end up to be the case, Google will probably talk about the new policy when it announces the next-gen Nexus devices sometime towards the end of the year.
According to rumors, Google will confirm that major software updates will be available for Nexus devices for two years, while security patches will go out for three years from the OS release.
For example, the Nexus 4 and Nexus 10 were said not to be receiving Android M, but will continue to get some security updates. As for the Nexus 7 (2012), we told you that it doesn’t qualify for anything.
2012 Nexus devices might be getting Android M after all
But it seems that things are not so black and white after all. According to a new report coming out of The Little Green Dude, recent updates to AOSP seem to indicate that this might not be the case.
While poking through AOSP repositories for the Nexus 10 (manta), it was noticed that the tablet was tagged with “android-m-preview.” On top of that, it had a valid commit (code update) from Google under the tag, dated to the 28th of May.
Similar commits for the Nexus 4 (mako) and Nexus 7 (2012) Wi-Fi version (grouper) were also identified.
But while you shouldn’t take this bit of information as definitive proof that these aging devices will actually get Android M, it does look pretty encouraging that Google is adding new patches to these devices while in the process of developing Android M.
This is certainly good news for owners of older Nexus devices, who were thinking that no new spark of life would be coming to their device anytime soon. Even so, you’d better take this info with a grain of salt before we find out more on the topic.
Regardless of anything, even if these devices end up getting Android M, it will certainly be after the preview period is over, as was the case of Android Lollipop last year. We’ll just have to wait and see.