What Will Google Call Its Next Nexus Smartphone?

In the last few days, rumors about what’s shaping up to be Google’s upcoming Nexus smartphone have surfaced online.

It appears the search giant is already gearing up for a release that’s whispered to be taking place sometime in the second half of the year.

Interestingly enough, we’re told that Google will be looking in the direction of China in order to choose a manufacturing partner. After working with LG, ASUS, Samsung, Motorola or HTC, Google seemingly wants a fresh perspective on its new Nexus lineup.

In an earlier piece, we explained why there’s sufficient reason to believe that Huawei will be this year’s Nexus smartphone manufacturer.

The current hearsay also indicates that another Nexus device is coming out this year, which will seemingly be produced by LG. It’s probably going to be a tablet and there's a good chance that it is going to be the next-gen Nexus 10.

But while we fantasize about the upcoming Nexus smartphone, I couldn’t escape a thought: given that last year in October Google rolled out the Nexus 6 handset and there are already two tablets named Nexus 7, what will the search giant end up calling its next phone? Here's a bunch of ideas.

It could be anything

Let’s think about the problem for a second. If we’re to look back in history, the search giant rolled out the handset from the lineup under the Nexus One moniker. The model was succeeded by the Nexus S, and then the Galaxy Nexus came along in 2011, which was manufactured by Samsung, hence the “Galaxy” moniker attached to it.

After the Samsung-made handset, Google started rolling out phones with ascending numbers attached to the Nexus name, including the Nexus 4, Nexus 5 and Nexus 6.

So Google did not maintain a linearity while naming is concerned, meaning that this year the tech behemoth might surprise us with anything.

Considering that Huawei is speculated to be behind this year’s model, what do you think of a handset called the Nexus Ascend?

Google might recycle old naming schemes

In 2012, the company launched the Nexus 7 tablet and one year later the second-generation Nexus 7 arrived in the wild too. How did customers differentiate between the two models? Well, by virtue of the year attached to the product name.

Which makes me believe that Google might be re-using the names it has used in the past while adding 2015 in the process.

This theory makes sense, since the numbers in the Nexus models ever since Nexus 4 aren’t version numbers, they are rounded-off numbers based on the screen size of the device. It might have been just a coincidence that the Nexus 4, 5 and 6 came along in sequential years. Or maybe not, since phablets have been getting increasingly popular.

So don’t be surprised if this year we see Google launch the Nexus 4 2015, Nexus 5 2015 or Nexus 6 2015.

Moreover, the tech giant might opt for attaching “New” in front of the device model. So we might end up seeing the New Nexus 4 or New Nexus 5. This might make it easier for some folks to make the difference between models.

Android Silver revival?

You might remember that word of Google starting this program surfaced a year ago. Android Silver was supposed to be Google’s next-gen line of high-end devices that would offer users access to top hardware and a stock Android experience.

Google never confirmed such plans, but the rumor mill claimed the search giant wanted to replace the Nexus and Google Play Edition smartphones and tablets with Android Silver.

However, a few months after the initial Android Silver report came in, another piece of info revealed that the company had postponed plans for the initiative for unknown reasons.

The Nexus 6 was launched soon afterwards. But maybe Google wasn’t yet ready to show off Android Silver and maybe this year things are going to be a little bit different.

So what would it be like if Google surprised us with the very first Silver smartphone this year? No Nexus attached.