Just a few days after announcing its smartphone business is shutting down for good, LG is now promising to deliver up to three years of Android OS updates to its existing devices. Rumors of LG leaving the smartphone industry had been circulating for some time, and on April 5, the company made the news official. The next few months will see LG winding down its smartphone operations, and by July 31, LG expects the process to be completed.
LG had to address many questions after making this announcement, such as how long warranties will be honored, what's happening to customer service, and so on. Among all of that, LG also said it would be delivering the Android 11 and Android 12 updates to "select models." This caught some people off-guard in light of LG's poor track record with software updates before going out of business, and shortly after making that initial claim, LG is now making it even bolder.
In another press release issued on April 8, LG is now saying that "all premium LG smartphones currently in use will receive up to three iterations of Android operating system updates from the year of purchase." More specifically, flagship phones released in 2019 and later (the LG Wing, Velvet, G series, and V series) will get three OS updates and "certain 2020 models" of LG's more affordable phones will get two. For a phone like the LG Wing that was just released in October 2020, that means it will keep getting OS updates through October 2023 — despite LG's mobile division expected to be closed by July 2021. It remains to be seen just how well LG will be able to live up to this promise, but assuming it actually does, it's a nice (and unexpected) olive branch for existing LG smartphone users. That said, it wouldn't be the first time for LG to make bold claims about software update support and then not follow through at all.
LG Says Android 12 Is Coming To Premium And Affordable Phones
Taking LG at its word, that means a lot of phones should be getting Android 12 later this year. In order of release from oldest to newest, that includes the LG G8, V50, V60, Velvet, Stylo 6, K31, K51, K92, and Wing. It's possible some of the lower-end K devices may not make the cut since LG says only "certain 2020 models" of its budget devices will be eligible, but there is a lot of potential here.
But that's exactly what all of this is — potential. While it's really exciting to hear that LG is going to update so many devices to Android 12 (and beyond), the fact remains that the company has yet to prove itself at being reliable in this regard. The Velvet and Wing, two of LG's most recent releases, are both still running Android 10 — and the same goes for basically every other phone that's now being promised updates to Android 12 and 13 in some cases.
It would be legitimately amazing if LG finds some way to follow through with its update promise. No one wants to see the company fail to deliver, and past events don't exactly paint the best picture here. This is good news for LG owners, but just approach it all with a bit of caution.
Source: LG