The March Security Update for the Nexus 5X and the Nexus 6P breaks Google Cards on both devices, some owners of the popular handsets are reporting. Users of the Nexus 5X and the Nexus 6P recently took to Google Product Forums to report the issue, explaining that swiping left on the home screen of their devices presents them with a “failed to load cards” error message that says the system encountered some unspecified issue when loading Google Cards. The thread detailing the bug currently has over a dozen responders saying they’re experiencing the same problem, indicating that the bug may not be widespread and is only affecting a smaller number of devices. Still, it’s currently unclear how the latest Android Security Update for the Nexus 5X and the Nexus 6P managed to break Google Cards and the Mountain View-based tech giant has yet to officially acknowledge the issue.
In the meantime, while clearing the cache of the Google app that manages Google Cards apparently doesn’t solve the problem, deleting all related data reportedly does as one user claims they’ve been able to fix the issue by clearing both the cache and other related data stored by the Google app. To do that, navigate to the Settings app on the Nexus 5X or the Nexus 6P, open the Applications menu, and locate the Google app. From there, tap the Storage option and use both the “Clear Data” and the “Clear Cache” commands, then reboot your handset. If that doesn’t work, one user even suggested to roll back the time on the device to an earlier period which reportedly resolved a similar issue on the Moto X (2nd Generation) in at least one instance, but most affected users will likely prefer waiting for Google to fix the bug than resort to such drastic measures that would likely break some other apps on their smartphones.
Seeing how the Nexus 5X and the Nexus 6P were manufactured by different OEMS — LG and Huawei — and they still started experiencing seemingly identical issues with Google Cards a few days ago, the latest Android Security Update is the likely origin of the problem. It remains to be seen whether Google remedies the issue in the near future, but more details on the matter will hopefully follow soon.