What we can say for now is that the once-again widespread suggestion that Android and ChromeOS are absolutely being combined into one indistinguishable identity — a single Google operating system that runs on tablets, phones, computers, and beyond and is identified entirely as “Android” no matter where you look or how you use it — is, as of this moment, little more than unsupported conjecture.
Only time will tell what Google is actually thinking and planning and how even the most concrete internal plans may evolve in the months and years ahead. But much like every other time this topic has come up in the tech universe, the instant assumptions and confident assertions are unequivocally off base and out of line.
To be sure: It’d be quite an interesting twist if Google were ever to fully combine Android and ChromeOS into a single unified system. Such a pivot would offer advantages to Google and to us, as lay users of these products, alike. But it’d also raise an awful lot of challenges that aren’t easily addressed. And, in many ways, an escalation of the more nuanced type of alignment we’ve seen between the platforms all these years could arguably be even more logical.
Maybe, hopefully, one day, we’ll gain a clearer picture of what exactly is on the horizon and how Android and ChromeOS will both come together and remain separate in the future. Despite what the internet’s click-seeking headline writers would like you to believe, though, that day has not yet arrived — and, by all counts, won’t be arriving anytime soon.
This story originally appeared on Computerworld
