Qualcomm recently announced that phones using the Snapdragon 8 and 7 series mobile platforms will be eligible for eight years of update support if they’re running Android. Google is on board and will work to make this happen, too. But what exactly does that mean?
It can be confusing because the word update means a lot of different things to us. An update is simply something you install that exchanges bits of software or adds new software to what already exists.
You get updates for apps, updates for your keyboard, and every other bit of software running on your phone, including the Android operating system. That’s where this comes into play.
Android on your phone — this also goes for tablets — gets updated three different ways. This affects at least two of the three and should also apply to the other in time.
You have platform version updates, and those are the ones everyone cares about, such as when Android 16 comes along to replace Android 15. This commitment covers these types of updates, according to Google. So, if you buy a new phone like the OnePlus 13 today that runs Android 15 and uses a Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite chip, you could get Android 23 in eight years. It will be a watered-down version of Android 23, but the platform and API version will be the same, so you can run all the same applications as phones in 2033.
Of course, your phone’s battery will have bit the dust long before then so it’s a bit of a hollow promise.
The Linux kernel (Android is just another flavor of Linux, mostly) is also included here because it may need to be updated and patched to support newer versions. Qualcomm says it’s committed to supplying whatever is needed for two versions of the Android Common Kernel to meet that eight-year window.
Next, you have Google’s monthly Android Security Updates. These are really the most important kinds of updates, but it’s hard to get excited about them. Qualcomm is also committed to providing the code to offer these for eight years. This means that no matter which version of Android you happen to be running, it will be as secure as Google can make it. If you replace the battery in your OnePlus 13 several times, and it happens to last until 2033, Android 23 will get the patches it needs to stay secure.
The last kind of update is a little weird, and most of the time, nobody talks about it because consumers never get to see it. Google supports Android versions that aren’t new with patches and security updates, too. That means if some company makes a product that works best on a specific version of Android, it’s still patched with the latest updates that apply to it.
Qualcomm is making these changes available so Google can use them to keep old versions maintained, provided the device itself uses a Snapdragon 8 series chip or a 7-series chip launching later this year. I’m sure Google is going to do this, but we won’t know until these legacy versions of Android require an update from Qualcomm to work.
Now for the not so good news
This commitment is nothing but good news, and it’s nice to see Qualcomm getting on board with the idea that we should be able to use our expensive phones longer. I love it, and I’ll bet most of us do. It doesn’t mean it’s going to happen, though.
It’s not going to be free. Nowhere in Qualcomm’s announcement does it claim these changes are going to be free, so nobody should have assumed they would. The current support window isn’t free, and it’s usually part of the purchase agreement when the chips are ordered; Samsung (for example) negotiates a price to buy 100 million Snapdragon chips and a support package for X number of years from Qualcomm.
Because this is going to cost money (a good bit of money, from my understanding), phone makers might not choose to pay for it. You or I would pay an extra $10 for a phone we knew would get extra support, but not everyone would, so a phone maker doesn’t want to add $10 to the cost of a phone.
I’m going to peer into a crystal ball and say that phones like the Galaxy S25 Ultra will be supported for eight years, but many phones using a “mid-range” Snapdragon series 7 chip will not. Right now, the OnePlus 13 will receive up to six years of updates, but even though the phone is powered by the Snapdragon 8 Elite, OnePlus may choose not to extend support beyond what it already promised just because Qualcomm says it can.
It’s simply an economic matter, even though customer service and sustainability should never be wholly based on economics.
Also, you should know that Qualcomm could do this for past generations of its products, too, but chooses not to. That’s also a financial decision and not limited to Qualcomm — every company that makes chips could offer up to a decade of support if it wasn’t so costly to task engineers on the project.
Still, this move makes phones more sustainable and even though phone makers might not be enthusiastic about offering eight years of updates for a phone they already sold, some phones will see it. Maybe those are the ones we should be buying.