Five Reasons to buy the Google Nexus 5

The Google Nexus 5 with Android 4.4 KitKat is easily one of the top choices for an Android smartphone. Its affordable with a $350 starting price and its powerful, thanks for its Snapdragon 800 processor. It also offers a camera with optical image stabilization, which should help you capture amazing photos in low light. If you are still unsure if you should make the Nexus 5 your next device of choice, here are five reasons you should purchase the Nexus 5



The Nexus 5 will come with some exclusive features not available to any other Android handset. These include features like low-power audio playback, full-screen wallpapers with preview and more. While the modding community has managed to unlock some of these features for other Android owners, only the Nexus 5 will have access to all of them

1) Low-Power Audio and Sensor Batching

Android 4.4 KitKat introduces support for low-power audio playback, according to Google: "...with audio tunneling, Nexus 5 offers a total off-network audio playback time of up to 60 hours, an increase of over 50% over non-tunneled audio."

Unfortunately, "audio tunneling requires support in the device hardware. Currently audio tunneling is available on Nexus 5 and we're working with our chipset partners to make it available on more devices as soon as possible."

2) HDR+ Photography

HDR (High Dynamic Range) Photography is a term that any camera enthusiast should be familiar with. Burst shots with different exposure settings get combined on the fly to bring out the details in both dark and bright areas of the scene. However it looks like Google has added some additional tweaks like sharpening algorithms.

Edges seem so clear-cut compared to the non-HDR+ frames taken with the Nexus 5, and Google has even managed to reduce the digital noise which appears with software sharpening.

3) Full-screen wallpapers with preview

If you've got a Nexus 5 (or certain phones with custom 4.4 ROMs), "your wallpaper now extends through the notification tray and system buttons. And when you change your wallpaper, you can preview just how it will look before you set it."

4) Always-on voice-controlled assistance from the home screen

With Android KitKat you can get access to Google Now by simply swiping to the left most home screen. However with your Nexus 5, no swiping will be necessary as you can initial Google now by simply saying OK Google on your homescreen. The voice search function will be launched without you having to even touch the display.

While it's not the always-on ability we have on phones like the Moto X, which listens to you even in locked state, its definitely a step in the right direction.

While we are not certain if this feature will be brought over to other Nexus devices, an early port to the Nexus 4 showed that it could also share in the same ability to launch voice searches from the homescreen with the "OK, Google" catchphrase. However we aren't certain how this will affect its battery life.

5) Touchscreen improvements

Google says that with "improved software and Nexus 5’s new hardware mean Android responds to your touch faster and more accurately than ever before." While we are not clear on exactly what Google means by these improvements, it makes it to feature number five on the list of list of exclusives that KitKat brings only to Google's Nexus 5.