Motorola's latest Moto G7 lineup is being received as budget offerings for regions which do not see support from Chinese OEMs like Xiaomi. While the Moto G7 may not be the absolute best value purchase, it often is the only available and viable option present in certain markets. Even then, consumers considering the Moto G7 series should be aware of what happened with the Moto G4 Plus, which is finally receiving its Android Oreo update now.
Motorola revealed its Android 8.0 Oreo plans back in September 2017. However, the Moto G4 and the Moto G4 Plus were curiously missing from the list. What made users furious was the fact that the marketing material for both the phones very explicitly mentioned that the phones will be updated to Android Nougat and Android Oreo (Android N and O at the time of the phone's release). After a lot of consumer backlash, Motorola promised to honor their update promise, with the caveat that "it will take some time to fit it into our upgrade schedule since it is an unplanned upgrade". It took them over a year to recruit testers for the Oreo update for the Moto G4 Plus, and the soak test update finally leaked in November 2018.
After a long, long wait, Motorola is finally rolling out the stable release of Android 8.1 Oreo for the Moto G4 Plus. This update has begun its rollout in the US and will soon reach all regions. This update not only bumps up your device to Android 8.1 Oreo, it also incorporates Android security patches up to December 1, 2018. Do note that you cannot downgrade your device officially after you install this update, which is standard practice.
We do not know the status of the Moto G4 for this update. However, seeing how the soak test was available for both the G4 and G4 Plus, we hope the update for the device is right around the corner. We are happy that Motorola is coming good on its promise, even though it is pretty delayed.