Google Releases Android 4.4.3 KitKat Factory Images for Nexus Devices

For months, Android 4.4.3 KitKat rumours have been doing the rounds of the Web, and mentions of it have been made by Google, Samsung and Motorola, without any details. Two mobile carriers in the US have also made its existence plain. While Sprint shortly removed mention of the Android 4.4.3 update on its support pages back in April, T-Mobile has announced it has started rolling out the Android 4.4.3 update to Nexus 4, Nexus 5 and Nexus 7 (2013) devices on Monday.

Meanwhile, it's worth noting that the Android 4.4.3 update is now listed on Google's 'Factory Images for Nexus Devices' page. While OTA updates have not yet begun, Nexus users can install the update themselves - note, a backup of all data is recommended before using the factory image, as it resets the device. A global OTA roll-out should begin soon however, and users can wait for that instead.As noted by the Androidos blog, Google has also sharedthe source code of the Android 4.4.3 KitKat release (kitkat-mr2-release).

According to T-Mobile's software support page, the build number of Android 4.4.3 for Nexus 4 and Nexus 7 (2013) (Review | Pictures) tablet is KTU84L, while the Nexus 5 has build KTU84M. The software support page on the mobile carrier notes that the update for the three Nexus devices is now available starting Monday.

As seen in previous changelogs, the Android 4.4.3 update seems to be an incremental update from Android 4.4.2 and brings security enhancements and various bug fixes, as per the support page. The new update is about 54MB in size and is available OTA (over-the-air) for T-Mobile Nexus customers.

Further, Google is said to bring few more fixes with its new Android 4.4.3 update which include fixes for data connection loss, random reboots, missed calls and various camera bugs. Other than existing bug fixing, the Android 4.4.3 is said to not bring anything new in terms of features and UI interface.

One of the major fixes that the Android 4.4.3 update is expected to bring is the 'mm-qcamera-daemon' crash. Earlier, the Nexus 5 (Review | Pictures) smartphone was noted to be affected by a new battery drain issue, which Google claimed was due to high CPU usage of the 'mm-qcamera-daemon' process that led to the battery dying sooner than expected.

An earlier report citing sources suggested that Android 4.4.3 was undergoing the dogfooding stage, and Google had given it to 1 percent of its employees.

From the dogfooding stage to the release, the Android 4.4.3 update seems to have travelled quickly and can be expected to roll-out the same way to other users. Recently, a report even suggested that Samsung has been testing the Android 4.4.3 version on its Galaxy S5 and Galaxy S4 LTE variants, according to leaked official document.