LG has made the popular Nexus 5 (2013) and the Nexus 5X (2015), but won’t be returning to the Nexus program this year.
LG is one of only a few companies that have made multiple Nexus devices, but now say it needs to focus inward. An LG spokesperson remarked at Mobile World Congress 2016 that, “LG needs to focus on its own brand”. This isn’t entirely unreasonable for the Korean giant. It has just announced the LG G5, which is a major release for it. The G5 features a metal, uni-body build that can be opened up and have modules added to expand the functionality of the phone.
Click here to read everything you need to know about the LG G5
Although its not clear how many units have been sold, the most recent Nexus from LG has been popular among budget conscious Android fans. Google has been promoting it (and the Huawei Nexus 6P) heavily on television, in print, and on billboards, but if you failed to notice who made the Nexus 5X or Nexus 6P you could be forgiven. Google often forgoes stating the manufacture of the phones in advertisements, and focuses more on the Nexus branding.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QLqHZLdt_jE
The statements from LG contrast heavily with another recent Nexus partner. In a recent interview a Motorola spokesperson sounded only too eager to make another Nexus device.
[blockquote author=”Adrienne Hayes, Chief Marketing Officer, Motorola”]I don’t know whether we’ll do another Nexus device, but we would be happy to. It was a good experience.[/blockquote]
It remains to be seen who will manufacture the 2016 Nexus device(s), or how many we may see. 2015 brought us two phones, which was a first, but with one OEM bowing out, who will Google turn to next? Will we ever see another Nexus tablet? The most recent Nexus 9 is getting on in age and could use a refresh.
Do you want your voice to be heard on who should manufacture the nexus Nexus? Head on over here and vote.
Its never good to hear of hardware partners bowing out of the Nexus program, but LG should be given a little bit of slack. The release of the 5X was overshadowed by the much more powerful Huawei Nexus 6P. I doubt that LG sees any advantage to releasing another phone with Google if that will be the case again Nexus year.
[df-gallery url=”https://www.androidguys.com/gallery/lg-nexus-5x/”]
[graphiq id=”fImz4CFcQPb” title=”LG Nexus 5X ” width=”600″ height=”700″ url=”https://w.graphiq.com/w/fImz4CFcQPb” link=”http://smartphones.specout.com/l/4343/LG-Nexus-5X” link_text=”LG Nexus 5X | SpecOut”]
Source: CNET
Personally, I don’t think they deserve to make another one as the 5X missed the mark in a few areas. The increased width and height of the phone and the relatively small increase in battery were a bit of the deal breaker for me. The increased width/height turned what was a perfectly great sized phone into just that little bit too big to be used as a one handed device which was a huge loss. They also followed every other manufacturers trend (why???) in producing a thinner phone (about 0.7mm less than Nexus 5). Why not keep the thickness the same or even add an extra mm to increase the battery capacity to around 3000mAh. There are a number of phones which are the height and width of the N5 but still manage to pack a huge battery (e.g. Xiaomi Mi 4c).
The Nexus 5X has some good points but LG really missed the mark in key areas I think.
LG in 2014 insisted they weren’t involved in a Nexus 5 successor as well… Until they were. I am not saying they will or wont, just pointing out that them saying it doesn’t mean anything positive or negative.