HTC Tipped to Launch 2 Nexus Smartphones This Year, Codenamed M1 and S1

A new leak suggests HTC is working on two Nexus devices codenamed M1 and S1 to launch this year. The leak corroborates an earlier report that said Google's parent company, Alphabet, had signed a three year contract with HTC to make Nexus devices.

Reliable tipster Evan Blass (popularly known as @evleaks) has tweeted details of the next HTC-made Nexus devices. Blass tweeted, "HTC is building a pair of Android N devices for Google internally dubbed M1 and S1 #nexus."

Android Police in a report says the names suggested by @evleaks are in-line with 'Marlin' and 'Sailfish' codenames of the HTC Nexus devices. The report adds that the 'Marlin' reference was spotted in Gerrit, which is a Web-based code review tool used by Android Open Source Project (AOSP). It adds that Google has previously used codenames such as Bullhead and Angler for Nexus 5X, and Nexus 6P respectively.

The report is suspicious about the 'Sailfish' Nexus device codename as there is a Sailfish OS. But it adds that the codenames are not meant to be marketed which could mean that the second HTC Nexus device may actually be codenamed 'Sailfish.'

In another leak, the rumoured HTC 'Marlin' Nexus device has been spotted on Geekbench browser benchmark listing. It however lists the device with "Google Nexus 6P" naming but includes different set of innards such as 4GB of RAM instead of 3GB of RAM on the Nexus 6P. The device is seen running Android N and has 'Marlin' motherboard.

Based on preliminary leaks, HTC is said to add the 3D Touch like display feature in its rumoured Nexus smartphones. If true, the new Nexus smartphones will most likely be running Android N, which will be useless without the pressure-sensitive display implementation.