Essential Phone

As expected, Essential releases July security patch within hours of Pixel

Damien Wilde | Jul 2 2019 - 4:25 am PT

Essential is still doing a superb job of keeping its devices up-to-date with the release of the July security patch for the Essential Phone now available.

Given that the company laid off nearly a third of its staff just last year, it’s genuinely impressive that Essential is still able to churn out updates so quickly and consistently. Granted it only has one device to update, it’s kind of awesome to see Essential put much larger OEMs to shame with its OTA releases.

If you’re still holding on to the Essential Phone, you’ll be bumped to build number PQ1A.190105.090. The changelog for the update doesn’t mention any other extras beyond the July 2019 patch. In that regard, there isn’t a great deal more to talk about.

Although it feels like groundhog day with each update at this point, when you consider the complaints that some fans level at OEMs for the state of updates, Essential deserves a ton of credit for managing to reign supreme in the speed and consistency stakes. It’s something that should definitely be lauded.

July's security patches are now available for Open Market customers. Check your Essential Phone for the latest pic.twitter.com/hc9WxrtFd8

— Essential (@essential) July 1, 2019

It will be interesting to see just how Essential handles the Android Q rollout though. Of course, it wouldn’t surprise us to see the full Q release within hours of the Google Pixel line as that is the company’s track record.

As it stands, if you’ve hung on to the Essential Phone and haven’t already received the July patch OTA, it might be time to head to your device Settings > System updates and manually refresh.