Essential ditches 8.0 Oreo release, but gives news on 8.1 beta

With Android 8.0 Oreo having been officially released in August last year, for the past few months Android users have been enduring the long wait for their phones to receive the update. While it took some time, as we enter the new year, more and more Android owners have been receiving their updates.

However, there is bad news for Essential Phone owners today as it seems like they will have to wait just a little longer. This comes as the company announced that it will be skipping Oreo 8.0 and going straight to 8.1.

In a statement on the official Essential Twitter account, the company explained that after Oreo 8.0 beta testing they discovered several “stability issues” which have lead them to decide to focus their efforts on Oreo 8.1. Ultimately, they said that this “will push the public release of Oreo back a couple of weeks.”

Of course, while this is bound to be disappointing for Essential phone users, in reality having an update a few weeks late is probably preferable to having one that is buggy and unstable.

As well as this, Essential Phone users are by no means the only people with a high-end phone that still don’t have Oreo. In fact, users of some of the most popular Android flagships including the Samsung Galaxy S8, S8+, and Note 8, as well as users of the LG G6 and LG V30 users outside of South Korea are amongst those still waiting for Oreo.

If you have an Essential Phone and you really can’t wait for Oreo, the good news is that Essential says that it’s working hard to get the beta for Oreo 8.1 out late next week.