Full release of Android O expected next week

Rumours suggest 21 August for the big day

Android O, the next major version of the mobile operating system, will be released next Monday - at least, according to strong rumours emerging online.

Prolific leaker Evan Blass claims that the final version of Android O likely will arrive on 21 August, coinciding with the impending solar eclipse.

Seperately, David Ruddock of Android Police has heard, albeit from unverified sources, that Google will reveal, if nothing else, the official name of Android O next week.

This comes after he tweeted that "the Android O update for Pixel has been pushed back", suggesting that Google is ironing out some last minute issues and might not push out the final update as soon as next week after all.

Ruddock added: "It also sounds like Google is planning some degree of spectacle around this. It won't just be a random 'oh hey here's a statue' thing." Exciting stuff.

Once it is available, Android O will make its debut on Google's own devices initially, including the Google Pixel and Pixel XL, Nexus 5X, Nexus 6P, Nexus Player and Google Pixel C.

Here's hoping the Android O rollout goes smoother than the latest Android Wear update, which has completely borked Google Assistant for users of the wrist-worn operating system.

According to reports on the company's forums, since installing the latest Android Wear update, Google Assistant can no longer set timers, send texts or control smart home devices.

Google has responded to user complaints, and said that a fix will be rolled out shortly.

"We identified some issues in Google Assistant for Android Wear that we are working to fix," said a Google community manager.

"We will be gathering bug reports from an email that you will receive, let us know." In other words, report the bugs to Google and sit tight.

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