Google promises Android Go phones at MWC 2018

Today Google promised on its blog to show off the first Android Go phones at Mobile World Congress 2018 next week. It also pledged the phones, in some cases under $50 each, would be available for purchase “soon after” the reveal.

Back in December, the company rolled out Android Oreo (Go edition) as part of the Android 8.1 wide release. Designed specifically for entry-level devices with 1 GB of RAM or less, Android Go gives manufacturers a stable, beautiful, and easy-to-use software experience for their very low-price phones.

Android Go is a slimmer and less resource-heavy version of the full Android Oreo experience. As such, Google has also been slowly releasing Go versions of its most popular apps, including Gmail, Chrome, Maps, and the Google Play Store itself.

Google also heavily reworked Google Assistant into a Go version that lets people quickly send messages, make calls, set alarms, and more using only their voice. However, since Google Assistant currently only works with eight languages, people in the developing countries Android Go is geared towards may have to wait before the app supports their native language.

Still, for many people around the globe an Android Go phone will not only be their first smartphone but also their first chance to access the internet. Many nations don’t have easy access to the world wide web and it’s terrific Google is making it easy for manufacturers to get devices with reliable software to those nations at the lowest price possible.

In the blog post, Google also discusses the massive impact of Android in the past ten years (2 billion active devices from 1,300 brands across 24,000 unique products), as well as its continued support of Android One devices. You can read the full post here.