Android N's Seamless Update Feature Not Supported by Current Nexus Devices

Google on Wednesday at its I/O conference revealed upcoming improvements to Android N, many of which were included in Android N Developer Preview 3. The company during the keynote confirmed that the Android N will bring 'Seamless Updates', a feature borrowed from Chrome OS. We now know that feature will be limited to the next-generation Nexus devices, however.

(Also see: Google I/O 2016 Highlights: Latest Updates and Announcements)

Android Police has learned that Android N's new Seamless Update feature has some technical requirements, which means older generation Nexus devices cannot support the feature. It remains to be seen if OEMs implement the requirements in their upcoming devices.

Dave Burke, VP of Engineering, at the keynote on Wednesday had explained the new 'Seamless Update', "The next time a user powers up their device, new devices can automatically and seamlessly switch into the new updated system image."

In the case of 'Seamless Updates' case, the system updates usually come in the form of deltas which means only the parts of the system that changed are downloaded to a backup boot partition. On restart, the backup partition becomes the primary. In case there is a problem with the update, users can revert the system to use the previous partition.

This means that we have to wait for the new Nexus devices to see how the 'Seamless' Update' feature works on mobile devices running Android N.

At I/O, Google also released the Android N Developer Preview 3 which was claimed by Google to be the first beta-quality candidate that will be suitable to test on a user's primary smartphone or tablet.

Some of the productivity features added in Android N include quick-switching between apps for easy multi-tasking, multi-window support, and better notifications. One of the major highlights of the keynote was the introduction of "Assistant," which is an upcoming expansion of Google's search tools.