Last week we asked you whether your phone has received the Android 15 update yet. Many already have, which is encouraging to see, but it’s not all rosy.
Over 40% of people who responded to our poll have Android 15 running on their phone – or rather the manufacturer’s implementation of Android 15. Around a third of voters are still waiting, even though the first updates started rolling out since October (that was for the Pixels, of course).
Worryingly, 20% – one in every five voters – do not have a phone eligible for v15. Extended software support windows are a relatively new trend and some not-so-old phones aged out of the update program.
For example, the Galaxy S20 series from 2020 will no longer be getting updates of any kind, even security patches. This marks the end of a 5-year support window. Modern Galaxy models will be updated for 6 years (including OS updates, not just security patches) if they are mid-rangers and 7 years if they are flagships. Hopefully, this will reduce the number of people with non-upgradable phones in the future – as long as the hardware still works, why not keep using it?
We also asked you how much you care about running the latest OS version. It turns out that you care quite a bit – that’s the option picked by half of voters. Around a fifth are willing to overlook the occasional delay, but it’s clear that timely releases are important.
Then there are those with more laid-back attitudes – some just want the latest security patch, others don’t even care about that. However, both groups are clearly in the minority.
We mentioned vendor-specific versions of Android above. According to the comments, those can have a major impact on how the value of an OS update is perceived – with some skins, it’s a very noticeable change, with others you can barely tell.
This has an effect on whether people care about OS updates. Still, most people want the latest software and they don’t like to wait for it – and pretty soon they will be waiting for Android 16.