Mishaal Rahman, who has a history of being right about Google and Android-related matters, is reporting that Google is intending to standardise its consumer operating system efforts onto a single platform: Android.
To better compete with the iPad as well as manage engineering resources more effectively, Google wants to unify its operating system efforts. Instead of merging Android and Chrome OS into a new operating system like rumors suggested in the past, however, a source told me that Google is instead working on fully migrating Chrome OS over to Android. While we don’t know what this means for the Chrome OS or Chromebook brands, we did hear that Google wants future “Chromebooks” to ship with the Android OS in the future. That’s why I believe that Google’s rumored new Pixel Laptop will run a new version of desktop Android as opposed to the Chrome OS that you’re likely familiar with.
↫ Mishaal Rahman at Android Authority
The fact both Chrome OS and Android exist, and are competing with each other in some segments – most notably tablets – hasn’t done either operating system any favours. I doubt many people even know Chrome OS tablets are a thing, and I doubt many people would say Android tablets are an objectively better choice than an iPad. I personally definitely prefer Android on tablets over iOS on tablets, but I fully recognise that for 95% of tablet buyers, the iPad is the better, and often also more affordable, choice.
Google has been struggling with Android on tablets for about as long as they’ve existed, and now it seems that the company is going to focus all of its efforts on just Android, leaving Chrome OS to slowly be consumed and replaced by it. In June, Google already announced it was going to replace both the kernel and several subsystems in Chrome OS with their Android counterparts, and now they’re also building a new version of Chrome for Android with extensions supports – to match Chrome on Chrome OS – as well as a terminal application for Android that gives access to a local Linux virtual machine, much like is available on Chrome OS.
As mentioned, laptops running Android will also be making an entrance, including a Pixel laptop straight from Google. The next big update for Android 15 contains a ton of new proper windowing features, and there’s more coming: improved keyboard and mouse support, as well as external monitors, virtual desktops, and a lot more. As anyone who has ever attempted to run Android on a desktop or laptop knows, there’s definitely a ton of work Google needs to do to make Android palatable to consumers on that front.
Of course, this being Google, any of these rumours or plans could change at any time without any sense of logic behind it, as managers fulfill their quotas, get promoted, or leave the company.
I’ve mixed feelings about this, because I’ve been enjoying ChromeOS as my “everything OS” for awhile now. It provides (a) solid driver support and power management on some good modern laptops (better than Linux) (b) a full version of Chrome that websites actually _believe_ is a desktop browser (unlike Android) (c) a “truly Linux” CLI and graphical environment that gives me access to a broad selection of dev tools and (d) Android apps if needed to provide good quality touch oriented UIs for various common applications that are not well supported on Linux.
That said I’ve always thought that Android has the potential to be a really good general purpose operating system, that has been gradually abraided by the sole focus on being a consumer oriented mobile OS. More focus on it as a desktop OS might turn this around. But I’m afraid what we’ll get is less good version of something like iPadOS, where the locked down nature and consumer focus makes it a poor environment for those of us who actually want control and flexibility in our devices.
I’m not sure this will fly.
They might want to unify their base runtimes, but even that is problematic.
There is Chrome OS, with atomic updates (which is the precursor to Silverblue and other similar container based systems. It is actually the original as CoreOS was based on Gentoo / Chromium).
There is Android with multiple read write and some read only partitions.
There is even the Fuchsia, which is their ground up open source microkernel operating system.
The philosophies are different. You cannot install packages on Chrome, but you can install virtual operating systems on containers, including Android.
And that is where they will have problems. They have promised 10 years of updates to commercial customers. Do you think a large customer with hundreds of millions on the line will allow experimenting with their mission critical devices? Nope. They will either have to keep Chrome OS for at least 10 more years, or be ready to pay massive damages in some high profile civil cases.
Okay, thinking back…
It seems like this is another “VP” taking in reigns.
We have seen this happen many times. A new VP is hired to direct a project, and they decide to “deprecate the old way” without giving enough time to build up a proper replacement. For one reason or another Google higher management does not question this, even though it has failed many times.
Not only this affects the morale negatively, it also has a trust deprecating issues for consumers and partners.
Google Talk -> Hangouts -> { Allo, Duo }, Hangouts Chat -> Chat
Google Checkout -> Google Wallet -> Android Wallet -> Android Pay -> Google Pay (might have missed a few)
Android Things -> Works with Nest -> Matter
Google Play Music -> YouTube Music
Google Chrome Apps -> Progressive Apps
Chrome Extensions -> Manifest v3
Google Cloud Print -> ???
And many, many, more.
In all of these instances the “new and shiny” was never a proper replacement of the older one. Heck, many years later, I still miss the features from “Inbox by Gmail”, which was supposed to be properly rolled into mainline Gmail.
This never misses to disappoint.