Google Nexus 7 II

Available now
24th July 2013

It has been a year since the launch of the original Nexus 7, and now the second generation Nexus 7 has arrived to take its place in the battle with the popular Apple iPad Mini.

Superficially the new Nexus 7 looks pretty similar to the old one, but the second generation device now has a 7" 1200 x 1920 pixel display (a huge improvement over the original), plus a quad-core 1.5GHz processor, 2GB of RAM with 16GB or 32GB of non-expandable storage plus a 5 megapixel camera on the back and a 1.2 megapixel one on the front.

Wireless charging using the Qi standard is included, as is NFC support. You can buy the new Nexus 7 in WiFi-only or LTE-enabled modes. The LTE version supports most 4G bands plus 3G and 2G data as well as WiFi, with slightly different models available for the North American and European markets.

This new Nexus 7 will run Google's new Android 4.3 operating system which has a number of improvements over earlier versions, most usefully it can now support multiple users including some with restricted profiles, to enable applications and content to be locked down if required. Because this is a Nexus device then you can expect to be among the very first to get new versions of Android.

Compared with the old Nexus 7 the new one is a little smaller and a fair bit lighter, coming in at 114 x 200 x 8.7mm and 290 to 299 grams. Inside is a 3950 mAh battery, which is quite a lot smaller than the previous one.. however the early reports of Android 4.3 that we have seen indicate much better power management which might compensate.

As with the old version, the new Nexus 7 has been manufactured for Google by ASUS who certainly know their stuff when it comes to tablets. If you live in the US then the new Nexus 7 should be available from 30th July starting at just $229, with other countries coming soon after that. The equivalent Apple product is around $100 more and is looking rather dated compared to this, but will it tempt people to swap? Perhaps not, but it should certainly put the squeeze on rival Android tablets.