Earlier this week, HMD Global laid out its plans to roll out the Android Pie update to the remainder of its smartphone lineup, saying that the Nokia 5 and 3.1 Plus could get it as soon as this week. Now, it seems like the licensee of the Nokia brand is delivering on that promise, at least partly.
Juho Sarvikas, CPO at HMD Global, took to Twitter to announce that the 2017 Nokia 5 has now begun receiving the update, which we"ve been able to verify on our own devices. The update includes the redesigned quick settings and settings app, the adaptive battery feature, and almost everything else that"s included in Android Pie. It also brings the January security patch from Google.
Since the Nokia 5 has off-screen buttons, you won"t be seeing the new gesture navigation, and the Digital Wellbeing dashboard is also not included. This is because the Nokia 5 isn"t part of the Android One program, and so the feature has to be added separately. This is similar to what happened with the update for the Nokia 8, and there"s a chance the feature will be added later.
The Nokia 5 is the oldest of HMD Global"s smartphones to get the update so far, having been announced all the way back at MWC 2017 and initially running Android Nougat. It"s the ninth Nokia-branded smartphone to run Android Pie.
We spoke to HMD Global"s Vijay Thangavelu earlier this month on all things Nokia and what the future holds for the brand, you can check out our interview here.