According to a new report, Android 11 development has started for several premium smartphones from Samsung. This information comes from Max Weinbach, who shared it via Twitter.
Android 11 development started for four premium Samsung smartphones
He claims that the Android 11 development has started for the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 2, Z Flip, Note 20, and Note 20 Ultra. Do note that Mr. Weinbach specifically says that this does not include the Z Flip 5G, only the 4G model.
Considering that the development just started for these devices, it may be a while before we see Android 11 rolled out to them. Those are not great news, but not many people expected it to come that soon either way.
These devices are the company’s priorities when it comes to Android 11 update. Well, along with the Galaxy S20 series, of course. The Galaxy S20 FE, which is expected to arrive in a couple of days, will ship with Android 10 as well.
Samsung has announced quite a few high-end devices this year, and it will have quite a task when it comes to updates. Users that purchase such premium devices do expect faster updates, for a good reason.
Samsung has improved when it comes to delivering timely updates, but it still can’t compete with some other companies, such as OnePlus, for example. OnePlus is expected to deliver stable Android 11 for the OnePlus 8 and 8 Pro soon.
The OnePlus 8T, which is slated to arrive on October 14, will almost certainly ship with Android 11 pre-installed. Based on previous experiences, the very first Samsung smartphones will start receiving Android 11 in December or January.
The company may surprise us and deliver these updates sooner than expected
Samsung may yet surprise us, and deliver those updates sooner, we’ll have to wait and see. The company’s custom UI is not exactly stock, and as you probably already know, a lot of Samsung’s very own software is included on top.
It takes time for the company to transfer all that to Android 11. They also need to make sure that the update is bug-free, for the most part. So, it’s not exactly surprising that Samsung is not amongst the first OEMs to push new major updates to its devices.
Android 11 is not a major overhaul of Android, quite the contrary. It’s just an iterative update that does deliver some interesting features to the table. There are a lot of changes under the hood as well.
It remains to be seen what exactly will Samsung adopt, though. The company is likely to adopt the vast majority of what Google introduced, though. First and foremost, the privacy / security changes, and the changes to the notification shade. You can read more about that here.