A little over a month since it landed at Virgin Mobile UK, Google’s latest smartphone offering, the Nexus 4 has now made the trip northwards to Canada and is now available through Virgin Mobile’s Canadian arm as well. A little over a week ago, Canadian folks were treated to a pleasant surprise when the Virgin Canada website sported a Coming Soon banner. And they haven’t wasted any time in making it available to the public.
The Nexus 4 packs a 4.7″ True HD IPS 720p display, a 1.5GHz quad-core Snapdragon S4 Pro processor coupled with 2GB of RAM and an Adreno 320 GPU, 8/16GB of internal storage, an 8M camera and runs Android 4.2 (now updated to Android 4.2.2) out of the box.
The Nexus 4 has already made its way to multiple Canadian carriers, with Videotron, WIND , and Fido already offering it. Virgin Mobile Canada is the latest Canadian operator to offer Google’s latest handset. You can get the 16GB version for an outright price of $399 CAD. And if you don’t mind getting locked in to a 3-year contract, you can even get the device for free. Operator pricing for this device, and this does not apply only to Virgin, is ridiculously high considering you can get the unlocked 16G version of the Nexus 4 for as low as $$359 CAD directly from the Play Store. Availability on the Play Store has been pretty erratic over the past few months since its November release. The device is said to be in regular stock these days, albeit with longer shipping time.
Buying the Nexus 4 through a carrier definitely seems to be more expensive, but given the spotty availability and long shipping times through the Play Store, getting it through a cellular provider might be the only and faster option to get it for sure. Secondly, if you are keen on getting a subsidized deal, then contract purchase through a carrier is the only way to go. Availability in the U.S has been worse, with a similar story at the Play Store, although it seems to be back in stock now, and T-Mobile being the only operator offering it on a subsidized basis, and retail pricing for the unlocked GSM version going up to as high as $450 or more.
If you are already on Virgin Mobile, or looking to switch, you can hit the link below to get the Nexus 4.