Google removes the Nexus 5X, 6P, NVIDIA Shield, Mattel View-Master VR Starter Pack, Goggle Tech C1-Glass VR Viewer, and more from Google Store
Android Police :
Context & Ripple Effects
The Google Store has been shedding hardware all year: after ending sales of the original Nexus 5 in early 2015, retiring the last Google Play Edition device, the HTC One M8, and confirming the Nexus Player's discontinuation in May, the storefront now drops the Nexus 5X and 6P barely a year after their September 2015 launch.
The batch is notable for what leaves alongside the phones: NVIDIA's Shield set-top box and two third-party VR viewers, the Mattel View-Master Starter Pack and Goggle Tech C1-Glass, signaling that Google's retail shelf is narrowing to its own devices rather than serving as a general Android showcase.
First-order effects
- Buyers lose Google's official channel for the Nexus 5X and 6P, pushing purchase intent toward third-party retailers and resellers just as stock of the phones thins.
- Partner hardware — NVIDIA's Shield and both VR viewers — loses its only first-party distribution point on Google's own storefront.
Second-order effects
- Third-party accessory makers learn the Google Store is not a durable retail commitment: placement there lasts only as long as Google's strategic interest, which raises the bar for any future partner device hoping for shelf space.
- With the phones exiting, remaining Nexus inventory concentrates with carriers and electronics retailers, who gain pricing leverage over the end-of-life models.
Third-order effects
- The repeated culls point to a Google Store consolidating into a curated first-party showroom — a structure later confirmed when even Google's own Pixel C tablet was quietly removed.
- Pulling the View-Master and C1-Glass viewers ahead of any successor strategy foreshadows how little staying power Google's mobile-VR accessory ecosystem would have, a thread that ends years later when the company phases out Daydream entirely and stops selling the viewer with the Pixel 4's launch.
The trend: Google is steadily converting its online store from an open Android hardware marketplace into a tightly curated first-party lineup, with partner devices cycling off quickly once strategic attention moves on.