After announcing the rollout of Android 13 for its Pixel devices on August 15, Google has finally started pushing out software updates for its Pixel smartphones in India. The updates bring plenty of new features and performance improvements along with some visual updates as well. Google currently only sells the Pixel 6a and the Pixel 4a in the country. The latest Pixel 6a is equipped with a Tensor SoC and features a dual rear camera setup. The Pixel 6 series isn’t officially available for purchase in India.
Android 13 update availability and size
Gadgets 360 has independently confirmed that the recently launched Pixel 6a and the older Pixel 4a models, which are officially available in India have begun receiving their respective Android 13 updates.
We have also confirmed the Pixel 6 and Pixel 6 Pro models that were not officially sold in India have also begun receiving the Android 13 software update. The update varies in size depending on the device. The update for the budget Pixel 4a is just 855MB, while the Pixel 6a’s update is bigger at 1.06GB. The Android 13 update for the Pixel 6 and Pro is around 1.25GB. As always it recommended that you backup your phone before installing the update.
Android 13 update issues
As mentioned in a previous report, users of Google’s Pixel 6 series of devices will not be able to roll back to Android 12 in case they aren’t happy with the performance of the Android 13 update, because the bootloader gets updated as well and increments the anti-roll back version, basically preventing users from downgrading back to Android 12 altogether.
Users of the Pixel 4a and below will still be able to roll-back to older software. As per the same report, some users have been experiencing some issues to do with wireless charging after upgrading to Android 13. The update seems to break the wireless charging functionality altogether for the Pixel 6 and Pixel 6 Pro along with the Pixel 4 and Pixel 4XL smartphones.
Android 13 features
Android 13 brings several performance improvements, bug fixes and new features to Google’s Pixel smartphones. Key among these are the newly expanded themed app icons that will match the phone’s wallpaper, an updated media player with album artwork and a new playback bar, the ability to assign different languages to individual apps and more control over notifications.