Rumor: Devices powered by the Snapdragon 800/801 won’t get Nougat because of the Vulkan API

After Android 7.0 Nougat made its official debut earlier this week, it became official that the beloved Nexus 5 had reached the end of its official support. While the device continues to live on thanks to developers, Google has dropped it after nearly 3 years, not that we should be surprised. With major releases of Android, plenty of older smartphones become officially outdated, even if they can still handle the new platform.

When it comes to a device like the Nexus 5, it runs Marshmallow just fine, so it probably wouldn’t have any issues with a newer OS. There is more to an update than just performance, though. Android Nougat introduces a lot of new changes under the hood, one of which is the new Vulken API which brings better gaming performances to smartphones running the platform.

This major change, as good as it may be, is apparently the reason why Qualcomm has decided not to release graphics drivers for the Snapdragon 800/801 CPUs, making official updates for devices powered by that chipset much more difficult.

This news comes to us via Twitter user LlabTooFeR. In a brief tweet (and through responses), it is explain that devices such as the HTC One M8 and other devices based on the 800 and 801 won’t be updated to Android Nougat, at least not officially.

There’s a long list of devices that are powered by these two CPUs, but let’s of course keep in mind that almost none of them are new phones. The list includes devices such as the Nexus 5, LG G2, LG G3, HTC One M8, Galaxy S5, and even the second generation Moto X. Most of these smartphones have already been dropped by their OEMs, but it’s great to at least know why updates won’t be coming to these devices. It also explains why Sony won’t be offering updates for the Xperia Z3.

While nearly all of those devices are older, there are two devices that stand out a bit, the OnePlus X and ZTE Axon. Both of these devices were released in the past year, and if this rumor is true, neither will see an update, not that we ever expected anything for the OnePlus X given OnePlus’ terrible track record of updating the device.