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 undertaking 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 understood for killing merchandise, however is that this a type of loss of life for ChromeOS or a metamorphosis? It’ll depend upon if Google truly focuses on making a platform constructed for the common laptop computer person or if it merely paints ChromeOS over with the daring but all-too-tacky Materials 3 Expressive aesthetic. At its latest I/O dev convention, Google mentioned the upcoming Android 16 is meant to help tablet-sized shows higher than earlier than. That’s a great 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 many of the consideration has lingered on the Liquid Glass redesign, the iPad maker just lately revealed its plans for iPadOS 26, a redesign that may lastly allow a number of app home windows on a display directly. Whereas the OS replace will make the iPad extra Mac-like, the developer beta exhibits how the expertise is tailor-made for tablets. If Google truly plans to make an actual change to ChromeOS, it must suppose huge. 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 common yearly characteristic updates that really feel extra like ChromeOS is being saddled with hand-me-downs from Google’s different flagship merchandise. There are specific options, like Google Duties integration on the app shelf and the GIF recorder made for sending a fast meme to mates, which might be all superb and dandy. However little concerning the expertise feels actually bespoke. Exterior 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 pictures? Bounce into the constrained cloud-based model of Photoshop.
This lack of a bigger ChromeOS developer group 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 working code, modifying pictures or movies, or taking part in video games. These are supposed to be low-cost units that anyone can get into, however extra in order that they’re a car for Google to push its varied subscription providers. The massive one as we speak is Google One, a $20-a-month service that grants you 2TB of cloud storage—which I’ll admit is engaging by itself—however the principle 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 additional price once you purchase a brand new Chromebook. In fact, you’ll need to cancel the subscription your self as soon as the invoice turns into due.
Over the previous few 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 just a few options like “Assist me learn” to summarize textual content or “Assist me write” to jot down an e mail when you may’t be bothered to format just a few naked sentences. There are another AI options Google likes to advertise, like Google Lens picture searches of your pictures 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 nicely.
None of this supplies what I might take into account a fleshed-out expertise. As an alternative, Google must give attention to making Android apps actually appropriate 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 essential 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.