How would you improve the Nexus 5?

[Suspicious-Teach8788]

Overall I'm very satisfied, but here's my list of complaints:

• Better speakers. Stereo would be nice, but in its current state the layout is like the iPhone but the output seems to be worse.
• Camera, camera, camera! 8MP or 13MP is fine to me, but the key is better image quality overall. It's still behind a previous generation iPhone 5 IMO. OIS was a great addition, but it doesn't seem like we're taking full advantage of it. Furthermore, the camera needs better continuous shooting speeds. 1-2fps is NOT acceptable. 6-8fps minimum.
• Triple mic setup to isolate exterior noise better (you know for those of us who still make phone calls?) And in general perhaps some better tuning of the mic. Speakerphone is difficult to use and it's easy for your voice to get lost. My gf ends up calling my iPhone when I need my hands free to talk to her. I don't have to shout to make sure I'm heard, the mics are setup well on an iPhone.
• Screen calibration. While the Nexus 5 had good calibration, the gamma was off. There's XDA threads about it, and it's good that we're way better than the Nexus 4 was this year, but everytime I wait for my phone to boot and watch the color profile get applied, I realize how much better it could be at Gamma 2.2.
• More storage. 32/64gb options hopefully next time?
• Better brightness curves. I thought the GNex and N4 were ok, but the N5's just too bright most of the way. There's 3rd party apps like Lux or CM's native autobrightness manager, but it would be nice to have a phone setup well without worrying about it.
• Bigger battery. 2600 mAh+ at least.
• One model to rule them all a-la iPad Air/iPad Mini 2 - roam across the globe with global LTE.

In general, I think if Google can address these issues, they've got a winner for the next Nexus.

I think the other challenges the Nexus 5 faces are more Android issues overall which probably belong in a different thread.

 

[Ravynmagi]

* Better speakers would be high on my list too. I like the location, but needs to be louder and better sounding. Though if they could make them front facing without making the bezel larger, that would be cool too (not likely to happen).

* I'm pretty happy with the display for an LCD. It's a huge improvement over the Nexus 4. I just took a quick look at lagom.nl/lcd-test and wow, the gamma is really off, but it's not something I've really noticed before. I like AMOLED displays though, so I wouldn't mind seeing an AMOLED Nexus phone again.

* No jutting camera. Camera seems good enough to me, I'd rather have a camera that was flush with the back of the phone and didn't stick out like the Nexus 5 camera.

* Micro HDMI port. Screw a $30 proprietary Slimport adapter or Miracast that doesn't work. Let's get back to basics and just give me a freaking micro HDMI port.

 

[TiredEngineer]

1) BATTERY. Seriously, Google's philosophy of "just good enough not to be bad" battery is terrible (this is across the Nexus line). OVERSPEC the battery. Add 1mm in thickness and $5 to the BOM (guessing on the cost here, but no way it is THAT much) and make the battery bigger.

2) Camera is OK. I would like it to auto-focus better and maybe push the pixels a little.

3) I agree with the speaker. It sounds so tinny.

General things Google needs to get better at across the board:

-Work with the automotive industry to standardize voice control activation. Every time I see Chevy advertising Siri I get angry. This should also activate Google Now (I would like Google Now to provide a little more feedback about my commands also...I had Siri for a while with the iPhone 5 and it is the feature I miss the most...especially with car integration).

-Tablet battery life...the iPad should be the bar. When I see the Nexus 10 having 60% of the iPad Air's battery, there is something wrong (especially for 3d gaming).

-Privacy controls (they took away my App Op Center). This should also extend into allowing apps to access the public directories. Apps should have to request permission. It wouldn't be hard for Android to apply an alias over a directory...so /mnt/sdcard/music is known as Music. PowerAmp says "Do you give me permission to access Music?".

-Chrome: Why does this not have "Immersive Mode" yet. Seriously, my Nexus 7 is HORRIBLE is landscape because the status bar and soft buttons take up half the screen. Also...they broke Highlight and Search...it used to open in a new tab, it drives me insane it opens the web search in the same tab.

Whew...sorry for the random Android rant. Still many times better than iOS (I lived in that ecosystem for years, and never want to go back...even though I have considered an iPad purely for the excellent battery).

 

[gmaster456]

• Better screen
• Better battery
• Better battery
• Better battery
• Better speakers
• Less washed out screen

 

[Ravynmagi]

Oh yeah, I should have definitely had battery on my list. I guess I've been getting too used to Nexus just-barely-get-through-a-day batteries.

 

[IeraseU]

A higher capacity battery is my number one request.

 

[gmaster456]

Oh yeah, I should have definitely had battery on my list. I guess I've been getting too used to Nexus just-barely-get-through-a-day batteries.

After doing that for a year with the Nexus 4 I finally gave up. It was a fantastic phone and one of my favorites but I rely on my phone to be there when I need it and too often I would find myself plugging it in every chance I got in hopes I could make it to the evening. Without a bump charge or two during the day I would be dead by 5 at the latest. Probably closer to 3 or 4 on a normal day. I'd have to keep it on the charger if I wanted it to get me through an evening out.

I finally caved and got a Moto X. Despite the battery only being 100mah larger it gets me into the night before I end up in the red. It's nice having that luxury again.

 

[zerogear]

*Larger battery
*Better speakers
*Waterproof

 

[Sunburn74]

Speakers are lousy. Fix them
Battery life is average. Extend it
Usable touchscreen can be extended to the length of the phone. Extend it

 

[Rdmkr]

imo, the nexus does what it's supposed to do. For people who want more there should be play editions of proper premium phones.

 

[Radeon962]

Larger battery. No issue with the rest of the phone and I would still be using it if the battery life were better. The Nexus 5 was by far my favorite phone of the year, except for the battery. I went to the Note 3 and good god you almost have to purposely use the phone to try and burn through the battery in one day.

 

[StrangerGuy]

Larger battery. No issue with the rest of the phone and I would still be using it if the battery life were better. The Nexus 5 was by far my favorite phone of the year, except for the battery. I went to the Note 3 and good god you almost have to purposely use the phone to try and burn through the battery in one day.

I can take my Note 3 and browse the net from 8am to 6pm straight and still make it home at ~20% charge. I havent got the N5 but I doubt it still have juice by lunchtime.

 

[mikeymikec]

I haven't used my N5 for long enough to know whether the battery is better than the previous low-end phone I had. I seem to be getting about 4 days out of either, which isn't a complete PITA yet isn't anywhere near what my old Nokia dumbphone could do (about 10 days).

I think the default apps that come with the phone need improvement.

Hangouts - it might be well-designed if one wants to intermingle G+ and SMS texting. If not, why should I be faced with the choice of having to either create a new Google account purely for my phone (in order not to see my G+ friends in my contacts list when I want to text) or having to scroll past them every time I'm texting someone who isn't a frequent contact.

Music - I had to roll back all updates for this app in order for cover art to even vaguely work, fully assisted by the 'cover art downloader' app. On my previous phone, I only had to use this app to fix about 5% of my albums that hadn't already been fetched by the Music app.

Play Books is exactly like what I'm used to and I don't use it often so I don't have any complaints there.

However, a problem I have with both Hangouts and Play Music is that they like to either show me a different starting point than I've seen when starting the app on previous occasions, or in the case of Hangouts, show me this *really informative message* about moods or something. Hello? Using this as a texting app. Not interested in G+ stuff.

On a separate note, I would like a phone at some point that doesn't put buttons that inadvertently get pressed as a result of simply holding the phone. For me, it's the volume control buttons that my thumb or the pad of my thumb is pressing quite often, especially when I go for the power button.

Overall I'm fairly pleased with my new phone. The screen is a heck of a lot better than what I'm used to. The timer in the clock app is a major improvement, the small fact that the app remembers that I was looking at the timer last and so shows me that first when I next start the app is much more helpful. I also like that I can have multiple timers and name them. Considering one of my uses of this phone is as a kitchen timer, it's pretty helpful.

The 'spagnola orchestration' ringtone is pretty cool IMO

 

[Suspicious-Teach8788]

imo, the nexus does what it's supposed to do. For people who want more there should be play editions of proper premium phones.

Why do people always say this? It's you're justifying a product's weakness. Remember, the Nexus phone wasn't always $299, so issues like poor camera has been a repeating issue.

I don't think Google intends for their product to be mediocre either. The main reasons behind $299 were likely because the lackluster appeal of the phone especially when the US crowd doesn't even understand the concept of unlocked phones.

1) BATTERY. Seriously, Google's philosophy of "just good enough not to be bad" battery is terrible (this is across the Nexus line). OVERSPEC the battery. Add 1mm in thickness and $5 to the BOM (guessing on the cost here, but no way it is THAT much) and make the battery bigger.

I do wonder about this though, but I think 2300 mAh is plenty. The GS4 gets less than 15% more but has insanely better battery life in tests. There's more to it than just brute-forcing battery. Incorporating better kernels implementing CAF commits might help for example. The opensource generic binaries that Google uses certainly are not optimized. There's a whole discussion on reddit this morning about how Project Butter's touch boost really screws the battery life of Android devices.

 

[MrSquished]

i don't get the screen improvements. this screen is great. not washed out at all. maybe some people prefer the oversaturated amoleds, but the nexus 5 screen was rated by anandtech as one of the best. after amoleds, i like this screen, and how easy it is to see outside in the sun.

 

[BladeVenom]

1) BATTERY. Seriously, Google's philosophy of "just good enough not to be bad" battery is terrible (this is across the Nexus line). OVERSPEC the battery. Add 1mm in thickness and $5 to the BOM (guessing on the cost here, but no way it is THAT much) and make the battery bigger.

Batteries are relatively inexpensive. The last iSuppli teardown I saw, estimated an iPad battery only costs $19. So I don't know why there are more models with bigger batteries.

 

[Suspicious-Teach8788]

i don't get the screen improvements. this screen is great. not washed out at all. maybe some people prefer the oversaturated amoleds, but the nexus 5 screen was rated by anandtech as one of the best. after amoleds, i like this screen, and how easy it is to see outside in the sun.

Go check the gamma. Brian completely ignored it in his discourse, and it seems that everyone just goes off the fact that he said it's a good screen and you can't say otherwise.

I compared the N5 to my iPhone 5, and definitely you can see the N5 is more washed out. I'm not saying we need oversaturated AMOLEDs, but if you don't believe me the stock gamma is 2.0, then you can see this XDA thread.

With that said the N5's screen is FAR better than the N4's screen. That gamma was something like 1.8. The suspicion back in the N4 days was that Google dropped the Gamma to give better brightness without having to dial the backlight up hoping to save battery. Yet the N4's battery was... dismal.