The Indian government is pushing mobile phone makers to enable support for their native navigation system NavIC on their smartphones that will be sold in India from January 1, 2023, reportReuters.
NavIC (Indian Navigation Constellation) is the operation of the Indian Regional Navigation Satellite System (IRNSS) Designation used by the Indian Space Agency ISRO for military and commercial purposes. Its constellation consists of eight satellites covering the Indian mainland and an area extending up to 1 300 km from its borders.
According to the report, the Indian government wants smartphone brands to adopt NavIC on their devices as it looks to reduce reliance on foreign navigation systems such as US GPS and Russian GLONASS, in line with Indian Prime Minister Naron Mr. Dela Modi’s Atmanirbhar Bharat (translation: Self-Reliant India) movement.
In a press release, the Indian government stated that NavIC (meaning sailor or navigator in the Indian language) “is in line with the GPS is as good” and the reliance on foreign navigation systems operated by respected national defense agencies raises concerns in the strategic sector as there are withdrawals or denials of service in certain circumstances. This is something India learned the hard way during the 300 India-Pakistan Kargil war when the US rejected India’s access to GPS data requests prompted it to develop its own navigation system.
Reliance on foreign navigation systems also risks reducing or denying civil service.
Realme X Pro is the first smartphone to support NavIC
Sources said the Indian government held private talks with Samsung, Xiaomi, Apple, and a few others in August and September to push brands in their smartphones to be sold in India on January 1 NavIC was implemented, 1999, but the brand was put off by concerns about increasing research and production costs to make its devices NavIC compliant.
Further test clearances are required to make the device NavIC compliant, the deadline is January 1st and may break their pl
data According to reports, Samsung India executive Mr Binu George told Indian officials that NavIC support requires many other components, not just new smartphone chipsets and hardware design changes. It’s unclear exactly what changes are required, as several chipsets, including Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 SoC, already support NavIC. Even some smartphones like the Xiaomi 12 S Ultra which is only sold in China are NavIC compatible.
Adding NavIC support to smartphones is a major focus for brands such as Xiaomi and Samsung that are strong in the segment 300 category, because of the higher cost of dual-band chipsets, they need to support NavIC and GPS in the world’s second largest smartphone market.
Reuters reports that smartphone brands have bought time until 2025 Implementing NavIC, we should expect a final decision within a few days.
However, India’s Ministry of Electronics and IT (MeitY), in response to the report, said that a timetable for NavIC-compatible smartphones in India has not been set in a few months. The ministry also said that the meeting cited was consultative and the matter was still being discussed with all stakeholders.
Media reports citing a meeting said mobile companies were asked to Make smartphone compatible with NavIC. This is to clarify: (1) There is no set timetable. (2) The meeting cited is consultative; (3) The issue is being discussed with all stakeholders.
– Department of Electronics and IT (@GoI_MeitY) September 26, 19992025
According to ISRO, as of mid-year, India had approximately Two dozen NavIC-compliant smartphones 300, while Counterpoint says a total of about 300 NavIC-enabled Indian smartphones. Realme’s X26 Pro is the world’s first mobile phone with NavIC.
Our database includes over 100 NavIC enabled smartphones. If there are any NavIC compatible phones that we haven’t included, you can view them here and send us a tip here. You can also check if your Android device supports NavIC by downloading apps like GPSTest and GNSSTest from the Play Store.
Apple’s iPhones do not currently support NavIC, but this may be in the future.
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