Google kills off the last remaining Google Play Edition device in the Play Store
Goodbye, Google Play edition devices, we hardly knew you. The last remaining GPE device in the Google Play Store — the HTC One M8 Google Play edition — has officially been removed from the Google Play Store and with that, every last trace of Google’s failed “Google Play edition” experiment has been scrubbed from the Play Store’s device listings page.
The HTC One M8 Google Play edition officially became available for sale back in March of last year and received Android 5.0.1 Lollipop back in December. Although we don’t have official numbers, we can’t imagine too many consumers were rushing to pay $700 for a smartphone they could get on contract for less than $200.
To be clear, the phone’s listing is still there (you’ll need a direct link to find it), only now listed as “no longer available for sale.” It wont be too much longer before the URL expires and the HTC One Google Play edition officially joins the ranks of devices like the Sony Z Ultra, LG G Pad 8.3, and HTC One (M7), Samsung Galaxy S4, and Motorola Moto G Google Play editions.
As for the future of Google Play edition devices, we don’t expect to see any new additions this year. Samsung snubbed the program entirely with the Samsung Galaxy S5 and even Motorola failed to release a 2nd generation Moto G GPe. While another crop of Android flagships are just around the corner, it looks like having stock, Google supported Android versions have sadly gone the way of the dinosaur.