Google showed off some great new features with Android M last week, but is there any guarantee that any of this year’s big flagship phones will get the new software in a timely manner? BGR alum Dan Graziano writes over at CNET that despite being “addicted” to Android for the past several years, he can’t be bothered to feel the least bit excited about it because he has no idea when his device will get upgraded to the platform, if ever.
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“I know I’ll probably never even see Android M on my current smartphone,” he writes. “How do I know? Because six months after its debut, I don’t even have the most recent version of Android (5.0 Lollipop), either.”
This is a problem we’ve written about a lot in the past, and Graziano’s experience isn’t unique. In fact, roughly 90% of all Android phones in use don’t have Lollipop yet even though it was announced a year ago and released half a year ago.
There are some ways to work around this, of course: You could buy a Nexus phone that gets updates more quickly since it runs stock Android. Or you could root your handset and install a custom ROM that will deliver the latest software.
That said, anyone who’s not a fan of the Nexus line or who doesn’t feel like rooting their phones is basically out of luck. And has Graziano says, “the whole point is that I shouldn’t have to do any these things — nor should the tens of millions of other Android users.”
Graziano’s full take is worth reading and can be found here.
