Great news, Android fans: Android 6.0 Marshmallow is going to start rolling out to devices next week. The not-so-great news: If you own an Android phone other than a Nexus, you might have to wait a while. Google said on Tuesday that Android 6.0 Marshmallow will be officially released next week. The company didn’t specify the date, but earlier leaks have suggested it will start getting pushed out to new devices on October 5th.
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Nexus devices will be the first to get the latest Android upgrades because they run pure Android and don’t have any carrier bloatware to update along with the basic software. When will other Android devices be getting this update? Well, that’s not exactly easy to say since the vast majority of Android devices are made by OEMs that load their own software onto them and are sold through carriers that do the same. This has often meant that many users have to wait several months to get updates on their devices — nine months after its release, for example, Android 5.0 Lollipop is still only on 21% of Android devices.
Marshmallow is going to add a lot of terrific looking features, including more granular control of app permissions, support for the Android Pay mobile payments platform, native support for fingerprint scanning technology, the newly enhanced version of Google Play called Google Play on Tap, and the new Doze battery-saving mode. Google has also promised that Marshmallow will have a focus on platform stability that has been lacking in previous Android upgrades.
