Category: ZTE Axon 7

After months of speculation, the Android Oreo beta program for the ZTE Axon 7 has opened up.  The first come, first serve program is open to owners of the 2016 device with the US model A2017U.  You can attempt to sign up here.

In the post announcing the program, ZTE indicated that as they get further into the beta program, more people will be added to it.  So, for now, if you don’t get picked, don’t fret too much.  You could get it later and frankly, being on the early builds of any beta is risky.

Good news for those of you who have the ZTE Axon 7, Android Oreo is now in beta for your phone.  The Chinese manufacture quietly began rolling out a beta program for the latest version of Oreo over the weekend, with select users being able to opt into the program.  While no official timeline was given on when an official Oreo build will come out for the 2016 flagship phone, which actually launched with Marshmallow at the time.

In the ZTE forums, there is a screenshot of the Axon 7 running Oreo with the notice that it is in the first round of beta testing.  Again, how many cycles there will be on the beta test is unclear.

For those who have the ZTE Axon 7, you have a new update rolling out to you that brings a lot of improvements.  The update has just been released so it will take a few days to get to everyone.  Once you have it, you will have the August 2017 Android Security Update on your device along with multi user support amongst other improvements.

The multi user feature allows you to setup user profiles and those individuals can use the phone.  This sounds very similar to the way native Android setups multiple users.   You will also find that the Hiya app that ZTE uses for blocking spam calls has been moved to the Google Play Store for future updates.

Chinese manufacture ZTE has started rolling out the Android Nougat 7.1.1 update to the Axon 7.  This is a big deal as it makes the Axon 7 one of the first non-Google devices to get the 7.1.1 update.  That, of course means that things like App Shortcuts along with overall improved stability is coming to the phone.  ZTE rolled out the Nougat 7.0 update earlier this year so having the 7.1.1 update follow up right behind it is a bit of a surprise.

The update comes with the February Android Security Update which brings pretty close to where Google phones are with the March update.  It also brings the new emoji that come in 7.1.1 and optimizations throughout the device.  The Axon 7 is also one of the few non-Google phones optimized with Daydream for VR and this update brings further optimizations to that element of the

ZTE Axon 7

phone.

If you have a ZTE Axon 7, the upgrade to this build is pretty small at under 200MB.  Once you have it downloaded, the update will take about 20 minutes to install and will require a reboot of your phone.