Galaxy S III (GT-I9300) and S III Mini won’t get KitKat

Sad news for users of the Samsung Galaxy S III international variant and the Samsung Galaxy S III Mini. Samsung officially confirmed that the latest Android update will not be available for the two year old flagship and its mini version.

Friends from SamMobile reached out to Samsung to clarify the confusion about the awaited update to the former flagship and here’s the response:

“In order to facilitate an effective upgrade on the Google platform, various hardware performances such as the memory (RAM, ROM, etc.), multi-tasking capabilities, and display must meet certain technical expectations. The Galaxy S3 and S3 mini 3G versions come equipped with 1GB RAM, which does not allow them to effectively support the platform upgrade. As a result of the Galaxy S3 and S3 mini 3G versions’ hardware limitation, they cannot effectively support the platform upgrade while continuing to provide the best consumer experience. Samsung has decided not to roll-out the KitKat upgrade to Galaxy S3 and S3 mini 3G versions, and the KitKat upgrade will be available to the Galaxy S3 LTE version as the device’s 2GB RAM is enough to support the platform upgrade.” – Samsung Mobile UK

After recent leaks that suggested the doom of the best-selling smartphone before, we finally got a confirmation. Yes, the culprit here is the 1GB of RAM but it’s KitKat, right? It should work well even on 512MB RAM phones. But this is Samsung and their TouchWiz skin adds a lot of features to the phone that might be the reason for this downfall.

The Samsung Galaxy S III went from Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich to Android 4.3 Jelly Bean while the Galaxy S III Mini began its software journey with Android 4.1 Jelly Bean and until 4.2 only.

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