HTC's third high-end phone is updated to Android 9.0 Pie, but no global rollout is underway yet
After months and months of radio silence, a vague announcement back in March, and a slightly more specific timeline detailed in May, HTC is all of a sudden on a roll on the Android Pie update front. While the company technically missed its self-imposed deadlines for the U11, U11+, and U12+, the three phones are now officially on the newest (stable) version of the world's most popular mobile OS... at least in one particular country.
We're obviously talking about Taiwan, the domestic market of this financially struggling smartphone vendor, where the "standard" U11 got the ball rolling in late May, then once again just a couple of weeks ago after initial kinks were ironed out. The U12+ quickly followed suit last week, and according to multiple reports on Twitter and HTC's community webpage, the U11+ is now joining the party with its own regional Pie-flavored goodie pack delivered over-the-air.
This is about as hefty as you expect, tipping the scales at 1.45GB, although the official changelog is also rather vague, including a generic mention of Android 9.0 UI tweaks, "system enhancements", and the specific removal of Google+ from BlinkFeed.
We'll just have to wait for the update to be released internationally before assessing its stability and utility beyond general performance enhancements, but unfortunately, we have absolutely no idea when HTC plans to expand these OTA rollouts for the U11 Plus, regular U11, or U12+. It has to happen soon enough, although you never know with this company. Hopefully, all three expansions will go down before Android Q goes out to Google's Pixel devices in its general availability form.
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