Android 15 just arrived on a tablet, but probably not the one you expected

If you’re an Android user, you’ll know how exciting or frustrating updates can be. Waiting for the next version of Android to arrive on your device can be infuriating, with a wide timeframe between different manufacturers delivering the latest features.

However, one of the first tablets has now been updated with Android 15.

The actual first tablet to get the Android 15 update was naturally the Pixel Tablet, but we’re a little surprised to see the new software arrive on the OnePlus Pad 2 so quickly. The company has already updated the OnePlus 12, so it’s making good progress through its updates, and cementing it as one of the best tablets.

Announced on the OnePlus Community pages, Android 15 lands on the OnePlus Pad 2 in the form of OxygenOS 15. It’s available for India, Europe and global versions now, with North America due to get the update in the next week.

Android 15, admittedly, isn’t a huge update from a features perspective. Many of the changes are under the skin, so you might not immediately find anything from Google in there. But, for a manufacturer like OnePlus, it’s an opportunity to push a wider range of updates and introduce new customisations and features.

Some of OxygenOS 15’s changes are designed to clean up the experience, with better animations and tweaked icons for greater consistency. However, others are to introduce new elements, like Live Alerts, which is a little like Apple’s Dynamic Island appearing in the centre rather than one corner.

Live Alerts will allow you to tap on something to open a card, as well as switch between different activities with a swipe. The notifications and Quick Settings can be split, to swipe down either element from different corners.

There’s also the option to pull a notification into a window, so you can deal with them in a more fluid way.

To help preserve the battery health on your OnePlus 12, you’ll be able to set an 80% maximum charging limit, with a reminder in place to prompt you into doing so. Of course, you don’t have to do this if you don’t want to.

Finally, there are a couple of tweaks to photo editing, meaning that filters that you apply when taking a photo can be removed in editing, and the settings from previous edits are remembered so they can be applied to subsequent edits.

As is the case with Android 15, this update doesn’t bring huge changes: it’s likely that you’ll see bigger changes through the evolution of Gemini through the year, bringing in new AI skills.