New updates are being added at the bottom of this story…
Original story (published on January 5, 2021) follows:
Plenty of Google Pixel users are reporting that their Google Play system update is stuck at a particular month and that there’s seemingly no way to update to the latest version.
Also while most complaints have originated from Pixels, there is plenty of evidence that points towards the issue being present on other Android devices as well – like OnePlus and Samsung.
For a quick recap, Google Play System Updates were introduced in Android 10. The Android version brought about several changes and one of them included Google identifying 13 core components and creating modules from them.
These modules can be directly updated by Google as and when required.
The biggest advantage of this was that OEMs, which are typically slow when it comes to updates, no longer are responsible for rolling out security updates. Instead, Google can now directly send out crucial security fixes through this implementation.
But as already apparent from the above complaints, this important feature isn’t working well for certain users.
Also, while it’s difficult to ascertain how widespread the problem is, it is not unsafe to say that quite a bunch of affected devices are now vulnerable to various exploits.
However, the good news is that the bug has been acknowledged and already been escalated by a concerned Product Expert. This is clear from a comment left by them on the Pixel Phone forums.
And while we all wait for a fix (I myself am affected by this issue), there is a workaround available to force Google Play system updates to the latest available version.
A few OnePlus users were able to manually download the Google Play system updates components and install them to success. You can do the same by visiting this link and downloading the latest version.
This will surely work on other devices too. Try the same and let us know in the comments below if it helped.
Also, be sure to check out our dedicated Android 11 bugs/issues tracker for further coverage on matters like these.
Update 1 (January 09, 2021)
Several Pixel users are now receiving the latest December Google Play system update after being stuck on October for a while as per this Reddit post:
While it’s unclear if the issue has actually been fixed, this still is good news.
PiunikaWeb started as purely an investigative tech journalism website with main focus on ‘breaking’ or ‘exclusive’ news. In no time, our stories got picked up by the likes of Forbes, Foxnews, Gizmodo, TechCrunch, Engadget, The Verge, MacRumors, and many others. Want to know more about us? Head here.
