Google today celebrated Halloween with two "treats" for Android fans. One was the Nexus 5, which has been driving rumor mills over the last few weeks. The other was Android 4.4 KitKat.
Originally named Key Lime Pie, Android 4.4 KitKat brings a host of updates to Android users. This includes a new Phone app, which Google says will make searching for contacts, nearby places and more even easier. There’s also a new version of Hangouts, which puts SMS, MMS, videos calls, and other conversations all in one place.
Google also worked on making Android smarter, so now you can get to Google Now with one swipe on the home screen and say, “Ok, Google’ to initiate any number of actions (such as voice search, sending texts, getting directions or playing music).
Google has also worked on making Android 4.4 KitKat accessible to those with older devices or devices with memory constraints. This was done by reducing the OS’s memory footprint by getting rid of unnecessary background services and reducing memory consumption of certain features. The end result is that Android can now run comfortably on a phone with 512 MB of RAM.
The Nexus 5 will ship with KitKat, and Google plans to ship the newest version to Nexus 4, Nexus 7, Nexus 10, Galaxy S4 and HTC One users in the coming weeks. Though Nexus 5 orders aren’t shipping for another week, it’s likely those buying the phone will be the first to get the Nexus 5.
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