Cheapest Android Phone with the Latest Version of Android?

Cromulent · 27 Feb 2017 at 17:22

One thing I never liked about Android is that it is very hard to always have the latest version. I think iOS does this better than Android but I prefer Android so I'll stick with it. I was wondering what the cheapest Android phone is that has the latest version of Android 7 on it? I don't really care about features although an SD card slot and reasonable camera would be nice bonuses. This is mainly for programming Android apps so probably won't be used as a phone all that much. Although if there is a camera and an SD card slot I might try it out for recording some videos and stuff.

I know very little about the whole Android marketplace as I don't follow it all that closely but I'd appreciate any help

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Cromulent · 27 Feb 2017 at 17:35

silverblack said:
Oneplus 3T around £418 from O2, not many phones around with Nougat TBH.

Thanks for the reply. That is somewhat more expensive than I was hoping. Hmm I'll have to think about whether a cheaper phone running an older version of Android would suffice.

Cromulent · 28 Feb 2017 at 09:01

Orcvader said:
Second hand Nexus?

If it's only for programming though, why not use an Android emulator/VM?

Sorry for the late reply. It is for a USB hardware extension that plugs into the USB port. I guess I could develop it against the Android emulator if it allowed reading from a PC USB port for the best level of testing a real phone would be good.

Cromulent · 4 Mar 2017 at 20:46

Ah. I'll check out the Nokia 5 and 6 as well as the Moto G5. Thanks for tips

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Cromulent · 11 Mar 2017 at 13:39

Psycho Sonny said:
It's not very hard to have the latest version at all. Just buy a Nexus device or Google Pixel, etc.

Yeah and pay a massive price just for the right to have the latest version of Android. For an open source operating system having free updates for the life of the phone should be expected no matter who you buy the phone from. Just because third parties add so much rubbish to the default Android install that they can't then easily roll out updates to Android isn't a good excuse. I'm starting to think the only reason non-Google phone manufacturers don't keep the latest version of Android on their phones is because they want to save the money instead of actually looking after their customers.

Why should I have to pay £500 for a phone just to get the latest version Android all the time? It is an open source operating system. I don't expect to have to buy a special computer in order to run the latest version of Linux so why do I need to buy a special phone to get the latest version of Android?

Cromulent · 11 Mar 2017 at 17:17

Psycho Sonny said:
You said it was hard. Not Expensive.

You could always buy a phone with a good community behind it on XDA forums.

so moto g, etc.

True. Maybe hard was the wrong word. Although I thought the thread title was clear in that I was looking for a cheap alternative. I'll look into the Moto G. Thanks for the tip

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Cromulent · 12 Mar 2017 at 20:31

biron_w said:
Try a second hand nexus or Oneplus phone. Then get it rooted, unlock the bootloader and stick a custom ROM on it. Easily the best way to be on the latest version of Android. Waiting for phone makers to update is always a pain.

Could do I guess although I'm always a bit worried about buying second hand. Maybe I'll check out the members market and see what is available. Thanks for the tip. I've never played around with custom ROMs before. In fact I could probably install a custom ROM on my old Nexus 4 phone if that is still supported.