ChromeOS Wants Extra Love and Consideration Than a Cellular Makeover With Android

After diving into the luxurious Lenovo Chromebook Plus 14, I’ve ChromeOS on my thoughts. Apparently, so does Google. In an interview with TechRadar, Android “daddy” Sameer Samat dropped a small bombshell about the way forward for ChromeOS, although with out offering any of the uncooked particulars. He mentioned Google plans to mix ChromeOS and Android “right into a single platform.” This venture appears to be within the early part of improvement. Samat mentioned he was analyzing what apps persons are utilizing on their PCs or Macs, which he would need to emulate in a revised Android laptop computer expertise.

Google is thought for killing merchandise, however is that this a type of demise for ChromeOS or a metamorphosis? It should depend upon if Google truly focuses on making a platform constructed for the common laptop computer consumer or if it merely paints ChromeOS over with the bold yet all-too-tacky Material 3 Expressive aesthetic. At its recent I/O dev conference, Google mentioned the upcoming Android 16 is meant to help tablet-sized shows higher than earlier than. That’s factor, since software program on Android tablets has been languishing for years.

Google’s plans to mix all its disparate ecosystems into one put it in stark distinction with Apple. Although a lot of the consideration has lingered on the Liquid Glass redesign, the iPad maker lately revealed its plans for iPadOS 26, a redesign that can finally enable multiple app windows on a screen at once. Whereas the OS replace will make the iPad extra Mac-like, the developer beta reveals how the expertise is tailor-made for tablets. If Google truly plans to make an actual change to ChromeOS, it must assume massive. It must create an expertise tailor-made to the lower-powered, lower-cost laptop computer design. And no, that replace can’t simply be extra AI shoved into each nook and cranny.

Chromebooks obtain regular yearly feature updates that really feel extra like ChromeOS is being saddled with hand-me-downs from Google’s different flagship merchandise. There are particular options, like Google Duties integration on the app shelf and the GIF recorder made for sending a fast meme to buddies, which can be all high-quality and dandy. However little in regards to the expertise feels really bespoke. Outdoors a bevy of streaming apps and some video games on the Play Retailer that play good with laptop computer resolutions, customers are anticipated to leap into the Chrome browser for all their necessary duties. Need to write? Use Google Docs. Need to edit photographs? Soar into the constrained cloud-based model of Photoshop.

This lack of a bigger ChromeOS developer neighborhood makes the Chromebook really feel an excessive amount of like a one-trick pony. You are able to do lots with it, although solely as far as you’re prepared to enroll in half a dozen cloud providers for operating code, modifying photographs or movies, or taking part in video games. These are supposed to be low-cost units that anyone can get into, however extra so that they’re a automobile for Google to push its varied subscription providers. The large one right this moment is Google One, a $20-a-month service that grants you 2TB of cloud storage—which I’ll admit is attractive by itself—however the primary cause it exists is it permits entry to Google’s most superior Gemini AI fashions. Google presently tries to entice customers with the promise of six months of Google One for no further price if you purchase a brand new Chromebook. After all, you’ll must cancel the subscription your self as soon as the invoice turns into due.

Over the previous couple of years, Gemini has come to roost on the corporate’s cheapo laptop computer line, and now it’s perched on the previous Caps Lock key because the “Fast Entry” button. There are a number of options like “Assist me learn” to summarize textual content or “Assist me write” to jot down an e mail when you possibly can’t be bothered to format a number of naked sentences. There are another AI options Google likes to advertise, like Google Lens picture searches of your photographs within the Gallery app. For the Lenovo Chromebook Plus 14, Google added its AI recording and note-taking app NotebookLM proper to the app shelf as effectively.

None of this gives what I might think about a fleshed-out expertise. As a substitute, Google must deal with making Android apps really suitable with Chromebook. Whereas I can get Disney+ or GeForce Now native apps proper from the ChromeOS desktop display, there are far too many apps restricted to working in pill mode. Chromebooks are nonetheless a definite type of laptop computer—one whose major promoting level is affordability—however they may very well be extra. It calls for a bespoke expertise that’s greater than only a gateway to Google providers.