In the battle for the future of the PC, Google just notched a win and opened the door for further gains later this year.
Chromebooks topped the Mac for the No. 2 spot in PC shipments for the first quarter of 2016, becoming the second-most popular PC platform in the U.S. behind Microsoft's Windows, according to research firm IDC.
The news was shared by Google CEO Sundar Pichai .
"Big news for Chromebooks: Android apps coming soon. And now #2 in the US!" he tweeted Thursday to his 474,000 followers.
The company also laid out plans to improve its Chrome OS line of computers, announcing at its Google I/O developer conference that Android apps will be coming to the platform.
As cloud-based computing continues to grow, Google's low-cost Chromebooks have found increasing traction. Unlike Windows or Mac OS X, Google's Chrome OS operating system is largely just a Chrome web browser . Most Chromebooks have less than 32GB of storage space and use processors that are not as powerful as the ones found on a $500 Windows laptop or Apple's cheapest MacBook Air .
But the lean requirements allow Chromebooks to be faster and cheaper than comparative PCs, with the laptops often starting under $300 and large number of popular models available for under $200. The combination of performance and price has made Chromebooks particularly attractive to the education market, where Google continues to gain momentum.
Of course the light specs cut both ways. Limited storage space and a lack of offline apps meant Chrome devices face a glaring limitation when not connected to the Internet. This week's announcement changes that, as it brings the over 1.5 million Android apps available on the Google Play Store to Google's Chromebook platform.
“I think it is pretty exciting," says Avi Greengart, research director at Current Analysis. "It really does address one of the key constraints of Chrome OS which is it's just a web browser. At a certain point there are things you want to do that you just can’t do in a web browser."
"In the past you could simply say 'why not just get a Windows machine' and then you run Chrome to your heart's content and you'll have all this other flexibility," says Greengart. He notes that today consumers are looking for experiences that can be found on mobile apps and are not necessarily available on traditional computers. "A lot of the app innovation that we’re seeing is not happening on the desktop, it's happening in mobile."
According to Google this will be the full Android app store, and any app that runs on Android — such as Microsoft's Office suite, Evernote, Instagram, Snapchat, Skype, Minecraft and more — can run on Chromebooks.
"The same apps that run on phones and tablets can now run on Chromebooks," writes Dylan Reid and Elijah Taylor, Chrome OS Software Engineers in a blog post announcing the update,"without compromising their speed, simplicity or security."
It remains to be see how well Android apps will run on Chromebooks, particularly as most were designed for smaller, touchscreen phones and not large screened laptops with a mouse and keyboard.
As with most Google updates, the new feature will roll out over time, starting in mid-June with the Acer Chromebook R11, Asus Chromebook Flip and the 2015 version of Google's Chromebook Pixel. Other Chromebooks, including a variety from Acer, Asus, HP, Lenovo, Dell and Samsung will get the update later in 2016. A full list of compatible Chromebooks can be found here.
Chrome's rise has been building for a while. "It's surprising from the fact that it's incredibly difficult to get an operating system off the ground in today's PC landscape," says IDC analyst Linn Huang of Chrome's rise.
"This is basically a perfect device for education, from both from a cost perspective and from a device and technology itself." Huang says education is expected to be the biggest driver for PC growth in the next five years.
"This notion of Google 'winning' US K-12 is huge because this is the one market that is by far outpacing every other segment in terms of growth. Winning here is definitely going to be key" to keeping Chrome's momentum going forward.
So, should Apple and Microsoft be worried? "It definitely means they have to wake up in education, but I don't necessarily know that either of those companies are shaken at a core foundational level," says Huang.
"In the grand scheme of things it's still just a blip on the radar."
