Nokia has recently announced that Nokia 7 Plus is joining the small lineup of non Google phones to get an update to Android 9 Pie. HMD Global chief product officer Juho Sarvikas made the announcement in a tweet today. Outside of Nokia, the update has only rolled out to Essential Phones, eight Motorola phones, and the OnePlus 6, which runs a modified version of Android 9 Pie, as well as Google’s Pixel phones.
Android 9 Pie brings a range of useful new features, like adaptive battery, tweaked navigation, and improved notifications that cut out the clutter. What’s notable is that the Nokia 7 Plus will be the first non-Pixel phone to get the Digital Wellbeing features, which shows a dashboard of your phone habits and tracks app time usage.
The update is happening in a phased rollout, and it will soon expand beyond the first 10 percent install base. The Nokia 7 Plus is a budget $400 Android phone that’s not officially available in the US but mainly targeted toward Asia and India. However, the Nokia 6.1, which actually is available in the US, is expected to get the update soon as well.
Despite the staggered release of Android 9 Pie, the update rollout been much faster than in previous years. It’s possible this may be due to a feature inside of Android Oreo called Project Treble, which is supposed to let manufacturers make easier, faster updates to their phones.
