Huawei's First HarmonyOS Laptop: A Major Shift from Windows
We've been witnessing Huawei's HarmonyOS powering their smartphones and smart TVs for a while now. It has been a journey for the Chinese tech behemoth, navigating a complex international landscape. But now they're taking a major next step: Huawei just unveiled its very first laptop that will come with HarmonyOS right out of the box, instead of the traditional Windows experience.
Why the Switch. It's a Bit Complicated
This move to their own operating system wasn't exactly a choice Huawei had made independently. US sanctions have put significant pressure on the company, and it's become difficult for them to work with US-based tech giants like Google and Microsoft. This impacted their phone use of Android, and more recently, it's been a problem with Windows for their laptops. The silver lining for Huawei, though. They now have much more control over the entire ecosystem of their devices, from the hardware deep inside to the software you interact with.
HarmonyOS: More Than a New Coat of Paint
You might remember that initial versions of HarmonyOS had a bit of an Android-with-a-different-skin sort of vibe. No more. Huawei has been working hard to make HarmonyOS distinctive, and it now has its own underlying kernel, its own interface, and lots of other features that set it apart.
So what's HarmonyOS like on a laptop. Picture a typical desktop setup. It has a taskbar and a dock at the bottom of the screen, and yes, you can multitask like a pro with multiple apps open in windows you can resize and move around. And since it's 2025, AI gets its star turn. Huawei showed how Celia, its AI assistant, can do things like summarize long documents or even help you bash out presentation slides.
What About Apps.
This is a big question. Naturally, a HarmonyOS laptop won't be compatible with the millions of Windows programs you might be used to on older Huawei laptops. But Huawei has already said that at launch, over 2,000 apps will be compatible. These are everyday software like WPS Office (a Microsoft Office rival that is extremely popular software developed in China) and a number of Chinese social media apps.
Own an Older Huawei Laptop. Don't Worry.
In case you are using an older Huawei laptop and it's on Windows, this news does not make your device immediately obsolete. Huawei has promised that Windows will continue to be supported on the existing devices.
This is a significant step taken by Huawei, as they now show that they are heading towards more independence in terms of software as well. It will be interesting to see how HarmonyOS develops for laptops and how people transition to this new model of computing.
Information sourced from: Weibo
