Google Stops Development of Lacros. There Will Be No Standalone Chrome Browser for Chromebooks

As Google announced, there is still a long way to go, but unfortunately, Google has stopped the Lacros project in order to separate the Chrome browser from ChromeOS and run it independently.advertisementIt's done.

The project has been in the works for over four years, with Google officially announcing Lacros for Chrome OS and releasing a beta preview last year. The goal of the project was to separate the operating system from the browser so that Chrome on a Chromebook would not be dependent on OS updates, allowing users to quickly get the latest features and security updates.

Lacros seemed to be heading further with the recent adoption of parts of the Android stack in ChromeOS, but unfortunately the decision has been made to end the project and support. It has now been revealed that support for the standalone Chrome browser Lacros for ChromeOS will end with ChromeOS 128.

This is very disappointing information, but there have been significant changes to ChromeOS since the launch of Lacros, for example, the major update cycle has been changed to every 4 weeks, and regular updates are now provided every week, and in particular, we have extended the update support period (update policy period) for Chromebooks and ChromeOS devices to 10 years, making it easier than before to receive new features, bug fixes, and security updates.

We also believe that adopting parts of the Android stack like the Android Linux kernel into ChromeOS has made it easier to deploy updates and features to both ChromeOS and Android.

Google hasn’t given a clear reason for the project’s termination, but given these changes, Google may no longer need Lacros. This is a shame, but since it’s only been offered as an experimental feature so far, there was of course a chance that something like this could happen.

Please note that Chromebook users are not affected by this change and we remain committed to continuing to roll out monthly releases and security fixes for both Chrome and ChromeOS.

To be honest, the benefit I got with Lacros wasn’t that it extended the life of my Chromebook, but that I could easily switch between multiple Google accounts like I do on Windows/Mac. Now, you have to restart your Chromebook and switch accounts by clicking the power button in Quick Settings and then selecting a different user. Also, it’s not possible to run windows in parallel, which is inconvenient when you want to use different accounts at the same time.

It's unfortunate to see the Lacrosse app go away, but it certainly won't have a huge impact since most users won't be able to use it.

source Google