Still Waiting for the Chromebook Revolution that Never Came (Premium)

In mid-2016, Google announced that it was bringing Android apps and the Google Play Store to Chromebooks. But that hasn’t happened yet, leading me to wonder about this potential game-changer.

I’ve long considered a potential linkup between Android, the world’s dominant mobile platform, and Chrome OS, the lightweight, browser-based OS that sits behind Chromebook and related hardware products. Actually, I’ve also long questioned the very need for Chrome OS, given the work that Google had already done—and has done since—on Android.

Google’s unclear messaging about the platforms hasn’t helped. The firm released two incredibly expensive Chromebook Pixel laptops in 2013 and 2015, but then it followed it up by a Pixel C 2-in-1 in 2016 … that was based on Android.

And then there are the rumors that Google will combine Android and Chrome OS into a single platform, code-named Andromeda. For example, in October 2015, the Wall Street Journal cited multiple sources in a story claiming that Google would “fold Chrome into Android.” Days later, Google apparently refuted the report, noting that it had “no plan to phase out Chrome OS.” But that line was consistent with the WSJ story, which noted that Google would “continue maintaining” Chrome OS. Point being, Google never really did refute rumors about its plans for Andromeda.

Then in April 2016, Ars Technica reported that Google would bring Android apps to Chrome OS, though the source of the leak more correctly noted the real terminology: “Choose from over a million apps and games on Google Play to install and use on your Chromebook.” That is, the as-yet-announced plan was to bolster Chromebooks specifically, and not Chromebox and other Chrome OS-based devices, with Android apps and the store.

It was never clear if this was our first real peek at Andromeda. That is, “folding Chrome OS into Android” isn’t the same thing as “running Android apps on Chrome OS/Chromebook.” In fact, it’s the opposite thing. But then that’s the nature of rumors, which often work like the telephone game, with murky and misunderstood information leading to conjecture and mistakes. So for now, we can only speculate.

But in May 2016, Google finally confirmed that it would bring Android apps to Chromebook specifically, and not to Chrome OS generally. (The reasons for this only became clear later; more on that in a moment.) It would do so over time, with the public released expected by the end of 2016.

More specifically, Google promised the following:

The Google Play Store is coming to Chromebooks. Chromebooks use the Chrome Web Store to find and install web apps. But this addition means that Chromebook users will be able to find and install Android apps too.

You will be able to run Android apps on Chromebooks. Any Android app that is distributed via the Google Play Store will run on Chrome OS in the near future, Google claimed.

Android apps on Chrome will have unique capabilities. Android apps will be displayed in three different window sizes on Chromebook, Google said, to allow the best experience. Users will be able to multitask with multiple Android apps in moveable windows along with a full desktop browser, all within the familiar Chrome OS interface, it noted, and keyboard, mouse, and touch input will seamlessly work together. Android notifications will appear on Chromebooks, and the performance is reportedly “excellent.”

The audience is everyone. This isn’t just targeted at U.S. education, the only market in which Chrome OS has been successful. This change is for individuals and businesses that use Chromebooks as well, Google said.

It will be a staged rollout. This is perhaps the crux of my concerns today. In May, Google said that the rollout of Android apps on Chromebook would happen in stages: The ASUS Chromebook Flip, the Acer Chromebook R 11 and the latest Chromebook Pixel would get Android app support first, in June, but only for those on the Chrome OS developer channel. And then, over time, this would roll out to other Chromebooks in the market too. Google says it is working with its partners to launch “some great new devices specially designed for Play” as well. But it would be “a few months” before we find out more.

We never did find out more. By the time 2016 had concluded, Android app support had only extended to a small list of additional Chromebooks, and most of them had to be using a beta or developer channel version of the OS. Android support for Chromebook is not available to consumers today using a normal, production channel version of Chrome OS unless you’re using one of those original three devices that Google announced in May. (And one of them, the Chromebook Pixel, isn’t even made anymore.)

What happened is unclear, beyond a cynical “not much.” No major new Chromebooks were launched in the second half of 2016, and certainly not “some great new devices specially designed for Play.” Something, very clearly, is wrong.

Before we knew that this initiative would go absolutely nowhere in the second half 2016, I offered up my opinion that Android apps on Chromebook could disrupt the PC industry, expanding on a previous editorial in which I noted that Post-PC devices like the iPad Pro (and the Pixel C) could potentially “pull the plug on the PC market.”

“Once Google adds Android apps and the Play Store to Chromebook, one could argue that Chromebook instantly becomes the most pressing and direct threat to Windows 10 on PCs,” I wrote at the time. “Chromebooks are now made by all of the top PC makers, are outselling all other devices combined in education, and are experiencing strong growth in the enterprise, with adoption at large companies like Whirlpool, Toyota, and Pinterest. And as reported last month, Chromebooks are now the number two computing platform in the U.S., having outsold the Mac.”

It’s interesting to me that the PC market, which has been in freefall for several years now, has thus far withstood this threat. The iPad Pro has done absolutely nothing to reverse the falling sales of that product line, and your chances of finding a Pixel C in the wild are about as good as seeing Sasquatch. Even Windows phones are far more common.

But Android apps on Chromebook? That is a clear and present danger to Windows. You know, assuming that it ever happens. I figured Google would announce something at its Fall event, but it didn’t. And for Chromebook, 2016 just ended with a whimper. We’re no closer to Android app support on Chromebook in January 2017 than we were in May 2016.

So what happened?

Based on early reports from reviewers, the user experience isn’t all that great. And it seems that combining the Android apps platform with that of Chrome OS/Chromebook is a bit more daunting than Google originally suggested.

And I think there’s a clue to why this is the case in statements made by both Google and, go figure, Microsoft.

Think back to that original announcement from May 2016, when Google said that Android apps on Chrome would have unique capabilities. If you know anything about Android app development, you’ll know that none of these capabilities are truly automatic. That developers will in fact have to “tailor” Android apps to run correctly, or at least elegantly, on Chromebook.

For example, the three window sizes. Sure, Android apps are designed to scale to different display sizes and resolutions, and I’m sure that is the basis of this capability. But it’s also a fact that Android apps tend to be designed for phone first, and that many of those apps appear to be stretched out and weird looking on tablets. Which, like Chromebooks, have larger displays.

Also, most Chromebooks don’t support touch screens, a core feature that every Android app assumes is available. Using touch-based apps with a mouse pointer can work in some cases, but it will be awkward or unusable in others.

In November, Microsoft explained how it would thus “partner” with Google to ensure that its own Office Mobile apps—which are designed for both phones and tablets–would work properly on Chromebook.

“[So] Microsoft must specifically tailor its Office apps for Android for Chromebooks, most of which do not support touch screens,” I wrote. “And for specific Chromebook models, since each can provide its own unique functionality as well.”

In other words, fragmentation sits at the heart of these troubles. Which is ironic, since fragmentation is one of the core issues with Android too. But in this case, Google has essentially made Android even more fragmented, because now developers will need to deal with a new range of form factors, many of which don’t even include touch capabilities.

I still feel very strongly that Android apps on Chromebook represent a clear and present danger to Windows. And for this reason alone, I will continue to watch the progress of this initiative, slow though it may be.

But the reality here, and this will rankle some Microsoft fans, is that we’re possibly living on borrowed time. So far, Post-PC devices like iPad Pro and Pixel C, and Google’s Android app support on Chromebook, have made little if any headway against Windows 10. But that’s because of the immaturity of those products, not because Microsoft has done anything to make Windows 10 better positioned to protect the low-end of the market.

In fact, I will further argue that Microsoft has itself basically abandoned this market. Yes, its PC maker partners will continue to offer some low-end PCs to combat Chromebook, and mid-level PCs that can compete against iPad Pro/Pixel C. But Microsoft has its eyes on the stars, on the premium and expensive end of the market. But those very PC makers who are supposed to do the hard work of battling the platform alternatives are also increasingly uninterested in doing so because the profits and growth are all in the premium space.

In other words, if Google and/or Apple can pull these things together and make them truly compelling alternatives to Windows at the low-end, this part of the market is basically waiting for them to make it happen. It could change very, very quickly.

It’s amazing to me that this hasn’t really happened yet.

As I wrote in May 2016, “this is a potential extinction moment, with Android and iOS playing the role of the asteroid that is hurtling to earth to kill off the Windows dinosaurs. And if you think PCs are a small part of personal computing today, it’s only going to get worse a few years down the road as an entire generation of Google-services-using, Apple-hardware-wielding youngsters streams into the workforce expecting to use the tools they’re familiar with. Our children are not growing up on Microsoft technologies. To them, Microsoft is as relevant as Sears, AOL or IBM.”

This is still true today. So I’ll head to CES this week with a number of goals. And one is to assess the health of the low-end PC market. Because this is a dam just waiting to burst.