Acer to Launch ChromeOS Tablet This Month? Probably Not

08.04.2014 Nate Hoffelder 1 Comment

Rumors have been circulating for 4 years that Google wanted to build a ChromeOS tablet and now it looks like the rumors might be about to come true.

Acer sent out an invite earlier this week for a press event. Specific details are scarce, but that hasn’t stopped one pundit from speculating that Acer could be launching a tablet running ChromeOS. What evidence does he have?

Close to none, actually, which is why I tend to doubt this speculation.

Yes, Google has been regularly releasing updates which improved how Chrome performed with a touchscreen, and that is probably a sign that they want to get Chrome on to a tablet. In some ways it is the stronger OS, and it handles large screens better than Android, so I would think that this would be an attractive option on 10″ tablets.

And yes, Google even teased us with a concept design in early 2010.

But in spite of all the details pointing towards a Chrome tablet, I also know that this Chrome tablet speculation has been bandied about at least 4 times in the past couple years. It seems that every time a major tablet was about to be released, some blogger somewhere raises the possibility that it might run Chrome.

Folks, I would be terribly surprised if Acer did launch a Chrome tablet at the end of this month. This is another unicorn rumor, IMO.

After 4 years of speculation, I am beginning to wonder whether the tech blogosphere wants a Chrome tablet more than Google does. With dozens and dozens of tablets launched in the past 4 years from major device makers, Google has passed up untold opportunities to release a Chrome tablet.

And what with the new focus on Android (Android TV and Android Wear), I suspect that Google now sees Android as their main focus, not Chrome.

Google could have launched a Chrome tablet by now if they had wanted one, or if nothing else they could have gotten out of the way of a tablet maker and let someone else make it. The complete lack of Chrome tablets is probably a sign that Google is blocking them.