Get Android M on your Nexus smartphone

Marie Brewis explains how download the Android M Developer Preview on to your handset today

It’s unlikely that the final version of Android M will be available to consumers until November at the earliest, when it will first appear on the new Nexus 5. However, if you have a Nexus 5, 6, 9 or Nexus Player and you’re desperate to get your hands on Android M, you can download the Developer Preview today.

It’s important to note that this is very early software and the Android M Developer Preview is intended for developers only. It is On a Windows PC, install Minimal ADB and Fastboot. You can download it from here – tinyurl.com/Lmstqa4. Download the appropriate Android M installer for your device, which you’ll find on the Android Developer’s site (tinyurl.com/q63q2eh). The Android M Developer Preview is compatible with the Nexus 5, 6, 9 and Nexus Player only. Do not install it on a different device. going to be buggy and you are going to encounter some problems with it. If you just want to take a peek, you can, of course, reinstall Android Lollipop – we’ll tell you how at the end of this article.

Be warned that manually installing Android M is not for novice users, and it’s possible to brick your device if you don’t know what you’re doing. It’s important to back up any data installed on your device before you begin since this will be lost in the process. You’ll need to extract the contents of the downloaded Android M file to a new folder on your desktop. We used the free 7-Zip (7-zip.org) utility to achieve this. From the folder on your desktop, copy the extracted files into C:\Program Files (x86)\ Minimal ADB and Fastboot. (Some users have needed to rename the .tgz file extension as .tar in order to complete this step.)