The long awaited Blackberry OS update is finally here, as Blackberry is currently struggling to maintain its position in a highly competitive smartphone market, the upgrade comes with a host of new features which brings Blackberry up-to-date with its iOS and Android counterparts.
The update is technically a maintenance update. One of the interesting enhancements of the Blackberry OS 10.2.1 update is that, it gives you the ability to install and run native Android APKs on your Blackberry 10 device, no more conversion. Is there any application you can’t find on Blackberry World? Go straight to any Android APK store of your choice and download.
Personally, this feature makes me feel Blackberry has a great interest in the Android OS. Can we have a Blackberry device running on Android OS anytime soon? That should be a topic some other day.
Catch a glimpse of the new enhancements and amazing features the Blackberry 10.2.1 OS ushered in:
Hub features a customisable “pinch to filter”
I guess BB 10 users are familiar with Blackberry hub, it is where all notifications from all sources; be it text message, email, social media etc can be viewed together. Due to the number of notifications coming in, things could get pretty crowded but with the new update users can now pinch the screen to filter new messages by type.
Off-line Browser Reading Mode
This is a feature we’ve seen on iOS devices. With this feature you can save web pages for latter reading, you don’t need an Internet connection to read cached web contents.
FM Radio This is a feature we’ve been missing on Blackberry, this update will automatically unlock the FM radio built into Z30, Q10 or Q5 handsets for music on the go, without any internet connectivity.
Lock screen now has a Picture Password option
This let you unlock your device your phone using a combination of a picture and a number (0-9) preset by you
Volume and media popups now appear at the top of the screen
Voice recognition provides more results from Wolfram Alpha
Lock screen notifications can be opened
New device and app monitor apps
Support for native Android apps
Install Android APKs directly from device or over the air
How to Update to BlackBerry 10.2.1
It is recommended you make a backup of your Blackberry 10 smartphone before you embark on an upgrade.
When the update becomes available on your carrier (its already available in Nigeria), to update your BlackBerry smartphone to BlackBerry 10.2.1, Goto the System Settings menu and select Software Updates. You should see the OS update.
The download will happen in the background, Upgrading from Blackberry OS 10.1 to 10.2.1 takes around 1.3Gb of data while OS 10.2 to 10.2.1 will consume close to 300Mb of data.
The following are foreign Carriers with 10.2.1 now available as at the time of writing:
EE (UK – 10.2.1.1925)
Airtel (India)
Bell (Canada – 10.2.1.1925)
Telus (Canada)
Rogers (Canada)
Welldone man.
Thanks boss 🙂