At the I/O 2014 conference a couple of months back Google showed off Android L, the next major iteration of its mobile platform. Public release is slated for this fall. Soon after the new software was unveiled Google released developer preview builds for a couple of its Nexus devices however the Nexus 4 was left out. This led to assumptions and speculations about Android L for Nexus 4, some thought perhaps this device won’t even receive the new update. However the possibility of a release still exists.
Few keen Google+ users have spotted Google employees claiming to use Android L on the Nexus 4, the employees mentioned this while posting on the Chromium section of code.google.com.
There has been hope for the Nexus 4 from the start. Back in July when the Android L AOSP code was released it did have partial support for the Nexus 4. Now that it appears some Google employees have access to a seemingly official build chances are that this device could receive the Android L update when it is finally released later this year.
Do not take this as an official confirmation though. For all we know Google may decide to not release the update for Nexus 4 even though its employees are taking it for a spin. They may be tasked with evaluating hardware viability and if the results are satisfactory that may be the end of Android L for Nexus 4.
It merits mentioning here that Google has committed to update new Android One devices to Android L so if the decision were to come down on pure specifications alone, the Nexus 4 can easily trump all Android One devices. We’ll have to wait and see how this plays out.