• Windows Phone Area
• On May 10, 2014

The first WP8.1-powered smartphones will reach the stores in a couple of days – some retailers have started taking pre-orders for Lumia 630, while the premium Nokia Lumia 930 goes on sale a bit later next month. But when the 8.1 update will reach the existing models? There is no official confirmation from Microsoft but according to the support page, Windows Phone 8.1 Lifecycle begins on June 24. That means Microsoft will provide support for WP8.1 from that date.

Redmond will provide support for the platform for a minimum of three years, from June 24 to July 11, 2017. For that period you can expect security updates, improvements and bug fixes. Each update needs to be installed in order for your phone to remain supported and you cannot skip an update, because each one is based on its predecessor. The end date for providing support to the OS is July 11, 2017.

When you will receive the 8.1 update, however, depends also on your carrier, region, hardware and phone manufacturer, so you might wait a bit longer to receive the latest firmware. With Microsoft beginning Windows Phone 8.1 support on June 24^th, you might wait a couple of weeks for your carrier to start rolling out the update.

We know that Windows Phone 8.1 will support all existing devices running version 8.0, including the low-end Lumia 520 and HTC 8S. Due to hardware limitations some of the new features might not be available for all smartphones – like the GDR3 update, which didn’t bring the Glance Screen to some low-end models.

Source: Microsoft