The other day we mentioned it was confirmed that BlackBerry 10.2.1 would see a launch on the 28th of January and sure enough that has happened as BlackBerry has officially announced the latest update to their smartphone operating system. Now it had been initially thought that only US carriers would get their hands on the update first, and the rest of the world would follow towards the end of February, but it turns out that the rumors weren’t entirely accurate as BlackBerry has announced in its press release that, “Subject to carrier approvals, BlackBerry 10 OS version 10.2.1 will be available to customers around the world, rolling out starting today in the U.S., Europe, Canada, the Middle East, Africa, Asia Pacific and Latin America.”The update will introduce a bunch of new features to the platform, such as customized pinch gestures, a floating action bar, SMS and email groups, picture password, offline browser reading mode, and more. Oddly enough one of the more interesting features, which is the ability to directly download and install Android APKs, was not mentioned in the press release, although based on reports the functionality is still there. This saves users time from sideloading which might not be a technique known by the less tech savvy. This also allows BlackBerry users to install apps that might not be otherwise available for their phones. We expect the update, like most updates, to be rolled out in batches so fret not if you have not received yours yet.
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