Google is rumored to be abandoning its incredibly popular Nexus 7 tablet in favor of a new, slightly larger Nexus 8 model. This comes from a report by Android.gs, which says it has been informed of Google’s plans by a source inside Google’s Dublin offices. While it may be hard to imagine Google no longer loves its baby tablet, it does fit in with previous talk about an eight-inch Nexus tablet, and less than stellar sales figures for the recently updated Nexus 7 tablet.
Talk of a Nexus 8 tablet reignited late last year, after a rumor claimed the tablet was being produced by Asus, and ushered in by Google due to lower than expected demand for the 2013 Nexus 7. Whether it’s true or not, the 8-inch market is considerably less crowded than the 7-inch market, and hardware such as the LG G Pad 8.3 – once rumored to be the template for the Nexus 8 – has shown the screen size can be a winner. However, the source also said we’d see the Nexus 8 in April, several months before the time estimated in this new report.
What’s more, the anonymous source pours cold water over our expectations for this year’s Google I/O conference, saying the company is planning to demonstrate new services, and not a new version of Android or any related hardware either. At last year’s Google I/O event, we were treated to more than three hours of primarily developer-related chat and demonstrations, so hearing Google will continue with the same format this year isn’t surprising.
Instead, we may have to wait until July to see the next version of the Android operating system, which could debut on the rumored Nexus 8 tablet. In 2013, Google revealed the updated Nexus 7 at a casual get-together in July, so a similarly themed event around the same time in 2014 is certainly possible.
Google has scheduled this year’s I/O conference for June 25 and June 26, but it sounds like our hopes of seeing some cool new hardware, even the wearable type, may need to be kept in check for now.
