Four days ago, a report surfaced, and quickly found traction, that Google had decided to fold its desktop operating system, Chrome OS, into its mobile property, Android.
That initial report painted a picture where, as early as next year, Google could show off what a combined Android/Chrome OS platform would look like, with a full rollout planned for sometime in 2017. Chrome OS has quickly found footing in several niche markets, including education, so the news that now, as the platform gains even more footing, Google would decide to roll it into Android seemed puzzling.
But other reports corroborated the first, so Google has taken to its official Chrome Blog to confirm that it does not have any plans “to phase out Chrome OS.” The blog post outlines why Chrome OS is such a good bet for so many people, especially in education:
“We’ve since seen that vision come to life in classrooms, offices and homes around the world. In fact, every school day, 30,000 new Chromebooks are activated in U.S. classrooms—that’s more than all other education devices combined. And more than 2 million teachers and students in more than 150 countries have the Share to Classroom Chrome extension, which launched in September and gets students onto the same webpage, instantly.”
And Google is quick to point out that Chromebooks continue to be best-selling devices on Amazon for every day consumers.
Companies often go out of their way to dispute claims that surface by way of less-than-official statements, so while Google is certainly saying that they don’t plan on phasing out Chrome OS, that doesn’t necessarily mean those earlier reports are inaccurate.
Do you think Google should roll Chrome OS into Android?
[via Chrome Blog]