TL;DR
- Google VP John Maletis says there’s a “super robust” pipeline of upcoming Chromebooks and Chromebook Plus devices through this year and into next year.
- The statement is the clearest confirmation yet that ChromeOS laptops are not going away immediately, despite Google’s newly announced Googlebooks initiative.
- However, Google still appears to be positioning Googlebooks as its long-term premium laptop strategy, leaving the future of Chromebooks beyond the near term uncertain.
With Google unveiling its brand new Googlebooks platform, one major question immediately came to mind: are Chromebooks on their way out? Well, now we know the answer, and it appears Chromebooks aren’t going anywhere, at least in the near term.
In an interview with Chrome Unboxed, Google’s VP of Product Management for ChromeOS, John Maletis, confirmed that new Chromebooks and Chromebook Plus devices are still actively in development and scheduled to launch well into next year.
“I’ve seen the pipeline of upcoming Chromebooks and Chromebook Plus devices and super robust, you know, through this year and even into next year,” Maletis said.
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That’s the clearest indication yet that Google and its hardware partners aren’t abandoning ChromeOS laptops anytime soon.
Googlebooks, announced during The Android Show: I/O Edition yesterday, are supposed to be a new category of premium laptops built on Android and deeply integrated with Gemini features.
Unlike Chromebooks, which are built for affordability and education use cases, Googlebooks are being positioned as premium, AI-first devices designed to compete with high-end laptops.
Maletis also reiterated Google’s long-term commitment to software support for Chromebooks. He noted that the company plans to honor its promise of up to 10 years of software and security updates.
“We will be supporting Chromebooks and ChromeOS, in some cases, through 2034,” he explained.
Maletis also revealed more details about Google’s plan to let some existing Chromebooks migrate to the new Googlebook experience in the future. According to him, eligible consumer devices will eventually get a path to transition to the operating system powering Googlebooks, while education and enterprise migrations will require a more careful rollout due to management tools, APIs, and policy requirements.
So while Maletis confirmed that Chromebooks are still very much alive for now, he didn’t completely reveal Google’s long-term laptop strategy.
Product roadmaps for laptops are often planned years in advance, so upcoming Chromebook launches don’t necessarily guarantee ChromeOS has an unlimited future ahead of it.
Google could eventually shift its focus from licensing ChromeOS to partners to Android-based Googlebooks. But for now, hopeful Chromebook buyers can still expect new devices to be on the way.
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