CHERRY Mobile earlier showed off three new smartphones under the Flare series. The Flare S6, S6 Selfie, and S6 Plus, as you probably know by now, made their awaited debut, with a bunch of killer hardware features and a killer price tag to match.

#RevuLive episode where we talked about Cherry OS and the new Cherry Mobile Flare S6, S6 Selfie, and S6 Plus

What may have escaped your notice, however, is Cherry Mobile’s big announcement on the software front. The Philippine-based smartphone brand now has its own user interface based on Android — the conveniently named Cherry OS.

Cherry Mobile now has its own user interface based on Android — the conveniently named Cherry OS.

And the Cherry Mobile Flare S6, S6 Selfie, and S6 Plus all feature the new UI. It gets better, because Cherry OS on the three devices will be upgradeable to Android 8.0 Oreo. Great news, indeed, considering most Android phones on the cheap never see an upgrade beyond their initial release. Cherry Mobile hasn’t given us a timeline for the rollout, but we’re crossing our fingers that the updates will come before the year ends.

Most Android phones on the cheap never see an upgrade beyond their initial release. Not the Cherry Mobile Flare S6, S6 Selfie, and S6 Plus, though.

While we wish we could say that it’s light and isn’t much different from vanilla Android, Cherry OS takes a heavy-handed approach with regard to customizations, and almost every aspect of the interface has been tweaked to varying degrees to look different.

Change isn’t necessarily a bad thing, though, and some might even argue that the new Android skin is a breath of fresh air. And to be fair, Cherry OS does offer some things stock Android does not.

SEE ALSO: Cherry Mobile Flare S6, Flare S6 Plus are officially here

 

For one, it’s preloaded with several first-party applications, like Privacy System, which gives you a password-protected space where you can hide apps, photos, and videos, and Avatar Master for running multiple instances of chat apps on the same device.

READ ALSO: Cherry Mobile Flare S6 Selfie launched alongside Flare S6, S6 Plus

There’s also a theme engine baked into Cherry OS. There are live filters that can detect your face and add dog ears, a Batman mask, or other zany effects. A beauty mode is available for smoothing out skin tone and blemishes, and we’re told the enhancements will differ significantly depending on sex.

We’ll discuss Cherry OS in greater depth in our review of the Cherry Mobile S6 Selfie, so do watch for that.

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