Google's Android Now Powers More Than 2 Billion Devices (cnet.com)

At Google's developer conference IO 2017, CEO Sundar Pichai said Android is now running on more than two billion active devices. The milestone, Pichai said, Google achieved this month. CNET adds: It took three years for Android to double its user base, having disclosed that it had 1 billion active devices at its developer conference in 2014. In 2015, Google said that it had 1.4 billion active users on Android. While phones make up a bulk of its devices, it's starting to see a proliferation of other gadgets running on the software.

Comments

Google IO 2017 Keynote

[UnknownSoldier]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

Re:Google IO 2017 Keynote

[Anonymous Coward]

only good interesting thing at all was the deep learning optimized cloud they offer, the rest are just incremental updates to the voice assistant. i hope they come with something actually innovative by the end.

And over 1 billion of them runs on a ancient OS

[Anonymous Coward]

Like, 4 gens. ago.

Re:And over 1 billion of them runs on a ancient OS

[Anonymous Coward]

Still better than Windows 10.

Google needs to step it up on the updates

[DeplorableCodeMonkey]

Now is the time not just for modularization, but for the big Android players to tell the carriers that the era of them deciding when OS updates get to devices is over. It would be really, really bad PR for Verizon or AT&T to be seen fighting a party composed of Google, Samsung, LG and Motorola over what amounts to "we demand the right to help our users maintain the phones you sell them." They'd fold pretty quickly because T-Mobile would immediately declare itself on the side of the Android vendors because John Legere would never miss such a golden PR moment to stick his boot up the ass of his competition.

Re:Google needs to step it up on the updates

[known_coward_69]

It's not going to happen because Apple has to go through the same carrier certification and not after what Apple did to AT&T all those years ago with buggy iphones polling the network all the time.

But when the day comes when all the android makers stop relying on the carriers for retail and warranty services, you might get your wish.

Re:Google needs to step it up on the updates

[TheRaven64]

It's convenient to blame the carriers, but I've owned three android devices (two phones, one tablet), all of which I've bought directly from the manufacturer. All three were different manufacturers (Motorola, HTC, and Asus) and not a single one of them received security updates either in a timely fashion or for anything approaching the lifetime of the device.

The problem is that there are no incentives. If you buy an iPhone, the same company responsible for pushing the updates takes a cut of all app store revenue. If a phone stops being able to run the latests apps, then their revenue from that user drops. If you buy an Android phone, the company that has to pay the cost of providing the updates just makes it easier for Google to make money from that customer. Worse, if your Android device stops getting updates then you'll probably buy a new Android device, so they have an incentive not to provide updates.

Re:Google needs to step it up on the updates

[SeaFox]

Now is the time not just for modularization, but for the big Android players to tell the carriers that the era of them deciding when OS updates get to devices is over.

You think it's the carriers that are holding updates back? I'm sure it's also the "big Android players" you're talking about -- trying to get people to upgrade their handsets to inflate their quarterly sales numbers.

Re:Google needs to step it up on the updates

[Anonymous Coward]

I bought 3 Google Nexus line devices back in a day - Galaxy Nexus, Nexus 7 (1st gen) and Nexus 4.
I was so naive to think that Google will provide updates because it's the Nexus line. Ha!

Fuck Google and their Android crapware. My old iPad Mini (2nd gen) and iPhone 5S are both running the latest version of OS.

Re:Google needs to step it up on the updates

[jezwel]

I received an update to my Samsung Galaxy S5 in the last week. That handset was released 3 years ago. Either your providers are not bothering to pass on updates, or the manufacturer isn't releasing updates.
In your case it sounds like the manufacturer is at fault - so good work telling us which ones to avoid!

The new Windows XP!

[Anonymous Coward]

Yeah, so ... how many of those billions of devices will be kept up to date over time, and how many will be unpatched & vulnerable, just waiting and ready to get pwned with ransomware, or turned into part of a botnet? How many are already in that state?

Re:The new Windows XP!

[Anonymous Coward]

if you watched their voice assistant for android announcement they said "100 million devices are eligible" so there may be 2 billion android devices sold, but only 100 million of them are anywhere close to being current. compare that to the number of iphones running ios 10. i want to like google, but android is just bad, and all they have that's actually valuable is search, even if it's now "voice search", not innovative sorry.

Re:The new Windows XP!

[Anonymous Coward]

I wish more people would stop trying to defend Google at this point. Yeah, I understand they did a ton for Linux and all and deserve a slight tip of the hat but they've really been going south fast with some pretty shady stuff. It's time for the fanboi base to move on to worshiping Elon Musk more or something.

Butt, how many dildos?

[Anonymous Coward]

How many dildos are running a version of this? Imagine this and then look around at all the content women, who no longer have to rock their crossed legs anymore.

Arguing

[ArhcAngel]

And half of them are housed in a warehouse arguing with each other over which one of them is a robot.

And how does he know?

[Anonymous Coward]

Oh, that's right. Analytics. From the always-on Google Store.

Re:And how does he know?

[Anonymous Coward]

Now "Google Play Protect" will scan every app on every device every day! Yay!

Powers?

[yodleboy]

That's interesting, when I pulled the battery out of my Android phone just now, it failed to power up. I can't even google for a solution now.

ugh, now we all have to learn kotlin for android

[Anonymous Coward]

if you thought the extra complexity of having to use objective c and swift in ios apps was a waste of time, now android not be be outdone is going to add a bunch of pointless complexity by adding support for that shitty kotlin language! woohoo, as if i didn't hate android enough already!

__Insert

[Anonymous Coward]

No one making a java joke out of this one??

Better headline

[Anonymous Coward]

"Google spys on at least 28% of the world population every minute of every day".

Your privacy are belong to them.

Re:Better headline

[uM0p ap!sdn]

only 28%, i'll take it !!

windows 10 takes the rest of the 72%

Java still has them beat

[MonteCarloMethod]

Java has been running on 3 billion devices seemingly since its inception. Android finally got to 2B?

Re:Java still has them beat

[nult]

HA! I was waiting for a java joke!

Re:Wow, more than 2 billion devices?

[Anonymous Coward]

It has certainly made the NSA's job easier.

Re:Wow, more than 2 billion devices?

[zlives]

whats MS upto...

How many are at latest update?

[Anonymous Coward]

How many out of these 2B devices are vulnerable because they don't have the latest security updates available?

Re: How many are at latest update?

[Anonymous Coward]

Just got a security update on my kitkat. I think it's fine tho it's not a new android version.

Re:Wow, more than 2 billion devices?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's funny that Android is far more popular than Windo...err I mean Malware 10.