Huawei has long been a troubled technology company, as the 2019 sanctions dramatically impacted its international operations.
The Chinese tech behemoth scaled down its global activities and focused more on its domestic portfolio, where it tried to expand in new fields, including automotive.
Huawei tried to get around the US sanctions – which forbid the company from using software and hardware belonging to American companies – by using the open-source version of Android. HarmonyOS was Huawei’s response to a world without Google, albeit the platform was more or less an Android fork that still allowed users to run Android apps with the right toolkit.
In plain English, Huawei no longer used Android, but thanks to its operating system running on Android code, it was still possible to run apps built for Google’s platform.
Everything is now coming to an end.
Huawei is ready for the next step of its transition from Google products. HarmonyOS NEXT, the company’s upcoming operating system projected to power its mobile products, will no longer offer Android support. It’ll be built without Google’s software, so installing Android applications won’t be possible.
Huawei has been working hard with developers to build apps specifically for its own platform rather than developing the required resources to allow HarmonyOS to run Android apps. Now that the project has gained traction, and its in-house OS already has the essential app collection, Huawei can go all-in on an operating system without Android app support.
Huawei claims this strategy will significantly improve performance and reduce battery consumption, so mobile devices running its operating system will see notable upgrades compared to Android phones.
Huawei giving up on the Android app support is basically the end of Android Auto on the company’s upcoming mobile devices.
If you’ve purchased a Huawei phone in the last few years, you probably know that getting Android Auto to run on the device has been a major challenge. While skilled devs in the community managed to find ways to get Android Auto up and running with a Huawei phone – albeit not all Huawei phones – the process was a major pain in the neck for beginners. Many gave up, relying on their mobile devices for anything that would have otherwise been available on Android Auto.
Huawei has been trying to fill in the gap with software that is supposed to replace Google’s services, including Google Maps. Petal Maps is a navigation app that has rarely received updates lately, offering turn-by-turn guidance, offline maps, real-time traffic apps, and other essential capabilities that get users from where they are to where they want to be more conveniently.
Huawei is yet to confirm this strategy, but considering its investments in HarmonyOS NEXT, the transition off Android is expected to be announced later this year.
