Google’s December 2018 updates bring patches, Pixel 3 RAM improvements, and more

Nexus and Pixel owners, Google has a fresh security update coming your way.

Google today released its December 2018 security update for Pixel and Nexus devices. The updates are now rolling out now to Pixel phones (though the original Pixel and Pixel XL are missing from Google’s downloads list), the Pixel C, the Nexus 6P, and the Nexus 5X. As usual, Google is offering factory images and OTA images if you’d prefer to update that way.

Also posted today is the Android Security Bulletin for December 2018. Google explains that the 2018-12-01 security patch level fixes vulnerabilities related to the framework, media framework, and system, while the 2018-12-05 security patch level adds fixes for the system, HTC components, kernel components, and Qualcomm components.

Finally, Google has shared its Pixel/Nexus Security Bulletin for the month. In addition to a patch for a vulnerability related to Qualcomm components, there are lots of functional patches for Pixel owners, like improved RAM performance for the Pixel 2, Pixel 2 XL, Pixel 3, and Pixel 3 XL. This should fix the issue that Pixel 3 and Pixel 3 XL owners have been experiencing that causes the phones to aggressively kill apps running in the background. All of the functional patches are: