Nokia phones beta labs is a service in which

beta software The software release life cycle is the process of developing, testing, and distributing a software product (e.g., an operating system). It typically consists of several stages, such as pre-alpha, alpha, beta, and release candidate, before the fi ...

for

Nokia Nokia Corporation is a Finnish multinational corporation, multinational telecommunications industry, telecommunications, technology company, information technology, and consumer electronics corporation, originally established as a pulp mill in 1 ...

smartphones are available for public download. The service was originally launched as Nokia Beta Labs in 2007 by Nokia for S60-based

Symbian Symbian is a discontinued mobile operating system (OS) and computing platform designed for smartphones. It was originally developed as a proprietary software OS for personal digital assistants in 1998 by the Symbian Ltd. consortium. Symbian OS ...

devices, and later for the company's

Windows Phone Windows Phone (WP) is a discontinued mobile operating system developed by Microsoft Mobile for smartphones as the replacement successor to Windows Mobile and Zune. Windows Phone featured a new user interface derived from the Metro design languag ...

-based Lumia line. After the sale of the Nokia mobile devices division to Microsoft, the website was renamed Lumia Beta Apps. It was discontinued in 2015. The service was revived by

HMD Global HMD Global (Human Mobile Devices) is a Finnish independent mobile phone manufacturer. The company is made up of the mobile phone business that the Nokia, Nokia Corporation sold to Microsoft in 2014, then bought back in 2016 by former executives ...

in 2017 for Nokia Android smartphones, allowing members to test Android 8.0 Oreo beta.

Overview

The applications provided by Beta Apps are in development, but are considered "mature" enough to be released in order to be tested by users worldwide. Anyone can submit feedback about applications, which goes to the development team. After a period of time, an application either "graduated", meaning it is released as a final version, or is removed from the site and placed in an archive. The site facilitates beta applications being developed by Microsoft or select 3rd party developers for Lumia products. The applications are, of reasonably good quality, but may have rough edges and occasional service breaks, not commercialized yet, not guaranteed, and not officially supported, under active development, free of charge and not be used for commercial purposes Applications may ''graduate'' to become commercial offerings, or they will be ''archived'' along with the lessons learnt based on user feedback.

History

Nokia phones beta labs was launched as ''Nokia Beta Labs'' on 16 April 2007 only as a page linking to other Nokia beta applications, namely

Sports Tracker Sports Tracker, earlier Nokia Sports Tracker, was originally a software tool for S60 (software platform), Symbian Series 60 phones (particularly those that included a Global Positioning System, GPS facility such as the Nokia N95, or bluetooth p ...

, Wellness Diary and WidSets. On 13 August, Nokia employee Tommi Vilkamo announced the website's renovation and his role as the new Beta Labs manager on his blog. After the rebranding Microsoft collecting feedback through

UserVoice UserVoice is a San Franciscobased Software-as-a-Service ( SaaS ) company that develops customer engagement tools.Ha, AnthonyUserVoice Aims Beyond User Feedback''NYTimes''. May 5, 2011.Finley, Klint3 Trends in Idea Management''ReadWriteWeb''. Se ...

and has since launched several new applications such as Cinemagraph Beta and Gestures. Originally the site was operated by Nokia but Microsoft moved the development to a more feedback-orientated design in August 2014 to allow more users to add their feedback rather than just Nokia-developers. On 14 August 2014 it was announced the relocation of the Nokia Beta Labs website to a new site that host all new beta trials for Lumia apps. Microsoft has discontinued the Nokia Camera Beta trial and re-released the Beta app as "Lumia Camera Classic" while implementing the new features in the Lumia Camera app, and has added

OneDrive Microsoft OneDrive is a file-hosting service operated by Microsoft. First released as SkyDrive in August 2007, it allows registered users to store, share, back-up and synchronize their files. OneDrive also works as the storage Frontend and backe ...

integration to Lumia Cinemagraph (formerly ''Nokia Cinemagraph'') after first trialing it in the Lumia Beta Apps site. On 25 February 2015 Join Conference (previously ''Nokia Conference'') was made public for all Windows Phones but republished under the '' Microsoft Garage'' and reduced the number of markets it was available in. In May 2015 Microsoft released the Lumia Camera Beta app reminiscent to the Nokia Camera Beta app to test improvements, among the new features is the ability to select

Office Lens Microsoft mobile services are a set of proprietary mobile services created specifically for mobile devices; they are typically offered through mobile applications and mobile browser for Windows Phone platforms, Binary Runtime Environment for Wire ...

from settings. Though these features are exclusive for newer

PureView Nokia PureView is the branding of a combination of technologies used in cameras of Nokia-branded smartphones and previously, in phones by Microsoft Mobile. PureView was first introduced with the Nokia 808 PureView. Hardware PureView cameras h ...

powered handsets, these devices include the

Nokia Lumia 930 The Nokia Lumia 930 (codenamed Martini) is a high-end smartphone developed by Nokia that shipped with Microsoft's Windows Phone 8.1 operating system. It was announced on April 2, 2014 at Build (developer conference), Microsoft Build 2014 and was r ...

, Nokia Lumia Icon,

Nokia Lumia 1520 The Nokia Lumia 1520 was a flagship Windows Phone phablet smartphone designed and produced by Finnish telecommunications manufacturer Nokia in partnership with American software manufacturer Microsoft. The device was first announced at the Nokia ...

, Microsoft Lumia 640, and Microsoft Lumia 640 XL. On 22 July 2015 Microsoft launched a new version of the Lumia Creative Studio called ''Lumia Creative Studio Beta'' that added support for living images if the photographs were captured with the Lumia Camera. On 11 September 2015 Microsoft announced that they would no longer accept any feedback via the Lumia Beta Apps site and would archive all older feedback and encouraged users to send feedback via the

Windows Insider Windows Insider is an open software testing program by Microsoft that allows users globally who own a valid license of Windows 11, Windows 10, or Windows Server to register for pre-release builds of the operating system previously only accessible ...

feedback application or through the

Windows Phone Store Windows Phone Store was a digital distribution platform developed by Microsoft for Windows Phone for publishers to release apps on and users to download apps to their smartphones. The app store was initially launched as Windows Phone Marketplac ...

, despite the discontinuation of the website no Lumia Beta App would be immediately removed from the store. Nokia Beta Labs was reintroduced for Android-based Nokia smartphones in 2017 by

as Nokia phones beta labs.

References

{{Nokia services Microsoft websites Windows Phone software Symbian software Nokia services

Overview

History

See also

References