Google Takes Aim at iPhone and Mac’s Special Relationship With Its Googlebook Laptop

Mac and iPhone.

It's a pairing that works seamlessly well,

but we don't have anything like that for Android.

Until now.

Google is announcing Googlebooks.

This is a new class of laptop

that runs Android and Chrome OS

so you can have that Android experience but on a laptop.

You can think of Googlebooks as a step up from Chromebooks,

but there are still standards

that Google is requiring hardware manufacturers to hit,

like for example,

backlit keyboard, a touchscreen,

and studio quality mics,

and of course that Glowbar.

Googlebooks are distinguishable by their Glowbar,

so that's the LED light that's here at the top.

Now developers can customize

and do things to take advantage of that Glowbar,

and there's a hidden app that users will have to find.

And once you finally figure out where to access it,

that's where you can customize the colors,

choose different animation,

and even make it sync to the music

that's playing on the laptop for a little bit of fun.

The OS very much feels like a blown up version

of Android from the quick settings to the widgets,

which by the way,

you can generate with AI.

That's a big theme.

There's a lot of AI features here

because this is supposed to be that next wave of computing.

For example, Magic Pointer.

The cursor hasn't changed on your laptop for decades.

Google is trying to wiggle things up

a little bit here with AI.

You can wiggle your mouse

and it will understand context on the screen

and pull up Gemini kind of like Google Lens,

detected this calendar event that's happening

and you can automatically get the option

to create that event and add it to your calendar.

Since it's understanding screen context.

Let's say you're looking at a picture of a dog,

just wiggle your mouse and now you can type,

what breed,

and it'll show it right there.

And Rambler, a feature that recently debuted

on Google's pixel phones

now natively available in Googlebooks.

Hi, this is Julian from Wired.

I am testing the Rambler feature

on the new Googlebook laptops.

Basically I can transcribe everything in any text field.

If you have an Android phone,

you'll experience all the joys that Mac

and iPhone users have experienced for a while.

That includes being able to pull up your Android apps

right on the desktop.

If you take a photo on your phone,

quickly access it and find it in the Files app,

load up a webpage on the Googlebook.

You can send it over to your phone

and immediately access it right there.

Those kinds of seamless transitions are now available.

As for apps,

there are kind of three ways Google is positioning it.

Yes, you can go to Google Play Store

and access all of the apps

that you might find available on Android.

However, there is also an optimized

for desktop experience,

mobile apps that are now optimized

for that larger screen.

And then there's a higher tier of that desktop apps.

And these were designed for desktop Googlebook experiences.

There are only about 20 or so apps like that right now,

but that will expand as the platform grows.

They start at 899

with pre-orders kicking off September 21st

and official sales starting October 4th.