Android 4.0 Headed for Verizon 4G LTE Devices

Verizon Wireless March 6 published a list of smartphones and tablets that will get the Google (NASDAQ:GOOG) Android 4.0, or Ice Cream Sandwich, upgrade this year, with most of the devices designed to shuttle traffic for the carrier’s 4G LTE network.

Launched in December 2010, Verizon’s (Long-Term Evolution) LTE network promises to facilitate data rates 10 times faster than that of its 3G predecessor.

Most of the 4G LTE smartphones from the carrier have launched with Android 2.3 (Gingerbread). Android Honeycomb currently powers 4G LTE tablets such as the Motorola Xoom and Motorola Droid Xyboard slates.

Ice Cream Sandwich (ICS), which blends qualities of the Android smartphone and Honeycomb tablet branches, launched first on Verizon’s Samsung Galaxy Nexus last December.

However, additional devices with ICS have been scarce, mostly relegated to prototypes at the 2012 Consumer Electronics Show two months ago, and devices such as the MIPS low-cost Novo7 tablet.

Now Verizon has confirmed that Samsung’s Galaxy Tab 10.1 and Tab 7.7 premium tablets will be getting ICS this year.

Motorola’s Xoom tablet, which is already getting ICS over the air, will be joined by the company’s Droid Bionic, Razr, Razr Maxx, Droid 4, and the Xyboard 10.1 and 8.2 slates.

HTC’s ThunderBolt, Droid Incredible 2, HTC Rhyme and HTC Rezound will also get ICS. Finally, LG’s Spectrum smartphone will also get the ICS bump this year.

Of these devices, only the Rhyme and Incredible 2 are not 4G LTE-capable.

The Android OEMs all have their own upgrade timelines. Samsung and HTC have been cagey about theirs, though Motorola posted its ICS upgrade schedule last month.

As eWEEK noted at the time, most of the Motorola handsets and tablets won’t receive ICS until the third quarter this year.