Galaxy S3 and S3 mini not getting an update to Android 4.4

Samsung will not update the Galaxy S3 and S3 mini to Android 4.4. The former Galaxy flagship and its smaller brother would have too little internal memory for the upgrade. The lte version of the S3 does get an update.

Samsung has told Samsung fan site Sammobile that owners of the normal S3 and S3 mini, which came out less than two years ago, that they should not expect an Android 4.4 update. The Korean company argues that the internal working memory of the S3 and S3 mini is the cause: that would be too small to handle Android 4.4. That is also the reason that the lte version of the S3 does get an update: it has 2GB of internal memory.

However, there are some question marks about Samsung’s motivation: compared to Android 4.3, which runs on the S3 and S3 mini, Android 4.4 has been optimized to also run on cheaper hardware with little memory. Android 4.4 only requires 512MB of ram; the S3 and S3 mini have twice as much internal memory.

In addition, there are other phones with only 1GB of internal memory that have received an update to Android 4.4. Samsung’s proprietary Touchwhiz interface layer over Android may be the cause, but it’s unclear why that wasn’t an issue with previous Android versions, which were less optimized for low-ram phones.

At the end of April, Samsung released Android 4.4 for the Note II. Other older models such as the S4 mini, two Galaxy Mega models and the Galaxy Grand 2 will also receive an update; according to Sammobile, those updates will roll out in June.