Nokia has stated that it is dropping Symbian for all its high end N-series phones, replacing it with the new MeeGo OS.

This means that the much-vaunted Symbian^4 will only be used on the mid range handsets it’s seeking to push into the hands of consumers to help maintain its share of the smartphone market.

“Going forward, N-series devices will be based on MeeGo,” said Doug Dawson from Nokia.

“Symbian is enabling us to bring smartphones to more and more people and ensures the benefits of scale for our solutions and services, and for developers.”

N8 getting a keyboard

What is odd is the new Nokia N9 (also known as the Nokia N8-01) has been snapped clearly running Symbian – meaning it’s likely to be the Nokia N8 with a QWERTY keyboard slipped on the back.

However, just to make things confusing, it seems the N9 will be launched as a MeeGo device in the future – don’t you love it when the internet rumour mill gets its wires crossed?

Either way, it’s good news that Nokia is pushing forward with a next generation OS – Symbian^3 hasn’t exactly set our world on fire in the demos we’ve seen, so if Nokia comes out with a platform to rival Android and Apple’s iOS then we could have another big player in the market once more.

TechRadar