After selling happily alongside its’s younger brother for almost two weeks, Google has finally removed the Nexus 4 from the Australian Google Play Store, leaving you with just one phone option – the Nexus 5.
Even with a price drop of $100 being applied to both the 8GB and 16GB Nexus 4 back in August, it’s taken until this morning for the device to follow the U.S. Google Play store to see the Nexus 4 sold-out. The Nexus 4 has been in-stock on Google Play ever since stock levels stabilised earlier this year, after an extended period of being sold out after the massive rush on November 14th last year.
While it lacked LTE, a great screen and a great camera, the phone was still an excellent value purchase, with many users managing to overcome the stock Camera experience to achieve some really stunning photos. It’s sad to see the sparkly backed phone head off into the sunset, but many won’t miss the broken glass front/back that was so easily achieved with the Nexus 4.
Any which way you look at it though, the Nexus 4 is now no longer available in Google Play, so it’s down to a fond goodbye, Vale Nexus 4.
Did you purchase a Nexus 4? What was the best thing about the phone?
I feel like the sound quality from my Nexus 5 speakers have improved significantly like two nights ago compared to when I first got it. Listening to music through the Play Music app was horrendous when I first got the device, but now it ain’t half bad. Is it just me?
I had hoped the Nexus 4 would live on at a cheaper price. Oh well, farewell faithful friend. Most stable, best performing phone I ever owned. Hopefully my Nexus 5 fills that role as well as it’s forbear.
What I don’t understand is why Google won’t make device purchases available through the Play Store app. I assume that the vast majority of Google Play customers use their mobile device to access the Play store. If Google wants more sales of the their Nexus line they need to get them under the noses of as many customers as possible. Leaving device purchases exclusively to the PC version of the store is really odd.
Pretty much everyone has a PC so I don’t see the problem.
PC sales and PC usage has long been on the decline and this trend will only continue. More and more people are using their mobile devices exclusively to access the internet. Google is missing a big opportunity by not advertising their hardware on their mobile Play Store app. Whether they care is another question.
Think of it this way. How many people do you reckon log on to Google Play on their PC? My guess is stuff all because people use the Play Store to purchase apps for their phone and tablets – not their PCs.
Good points so I see what you mean and adding that option would be good, but the PC decline isn’t necessarily what people make it out to be, there will still be strong PC sales in this decade.
Oh absolutely, PCs will keep seeking for years to come. But the growth is in the mobile computing.
I think if they’re going to integrate that feature for devices they can hopefully also allow purchases with gift cards (for those that accumulate enough balance).
I love the N4, my first Nexus device. Easily the best phone I’ve had since my first Android, the Galaxy S2 which was a barnstormer at the time; especially when compared to my woeful iPhone 3G running iOS 4.
I’d love to see Google build a $700 Nexus device. I know that goes against the concept, but imagine a Nexus without compromises in Speaker, Battery and Camera! You could say that Google Edition phones fit that bill, but they’re not quite vanilla Android I don’t think; I haven’t had a chance to play with one.
Agree, I don’t think it would even need to be that much more. $100 more would easily cover all those features when you are building hundreds of thousands of devices.
All Nexus brand phones need to be under $500. That’s why I personally love the Nexus line, I get an almost premium level phone without having to spend $700-$800 outright, or go on a contract.
As for the Nexus 4, the one I have has been my main phone since January 2013, I’ll be skipping the Nexus 5 and waiting until the Nexus 6 is released.
It’ll be the Nexus 5 (2014). Google has most likely gone with a naming scheme that reflects the screen size. Otherwise the future will be very confusing trying to work out what device is what.
Still a great phone even with a crap battery, speaker and storage. Compared the speaker in my n4 against anñ5 yesterday and the n5 was quieter and tinier.
Is the speaker really as bad as everyone says in the N5? A lot of people said the N4 speaker was bad, and it’s not that bad! What do you reckon?
The N4 speaker was not very good, My old Nokia Navigator had better speakers and the positioning was crap. But yeh compared to the N5 it is both louder and clearer.