With the upcoming Huawei devices featuring an all new operating system (due to the trade complications between the the US and China), we’re about to see Huawei’s proprietary OS, Harmony. But what can we expect from the new interface, and how does it compare with the Android OS we’ve come to know.
What does Harmony run on?
From a technical perspective, the main difference between Harmony and Android is that Harmony doesn’t feature Linux at its core. This may sound like gibberish, but Linux is the base boot-loading system which Android operates on – with many OSs using Linux as a foundation due to its open-source nature. Huawei’s Harmony is an entirely independently-built system that runs on its own, without the need for a Linux loader, so it should be interesting to see what Huawei does with it.
Will Huawei’s new devices have Google services & apps?
As of now, Huawei’s upcoming devices, the Mate 30 Pro most notably, hasn’t received the Google Play certification, which is a must to preload Android OS and Google services on it. So, it’s safe to assume that Huawei’s upcoming smartphones and wearables will all use the Harmony OS. But, with that said, Huawei has said that it has a plan in place to switch any device to Android is needed and if the restrictions are lifted.
It will reportedly be faster than Android
Huawei is using “distributed OS” as its new play to sell its latest offering in the smartphone industry. Harmony OS uses distributed task scheduling and distributed data management to improve its performance. Huawei argues that its “distributed” Harmony OS can outperform Android on the fact that Android uses a lot of redundant code, an outdated scheduling mechanism and has fragmentation issues.
Apps?
One of the unknown quantities of Harmony OS is the extent of is app library. We know that Huawei has been working on its own archive of applications and services, but the fact that Harmony won’t have access to the suite of Google apps (Gmail, Google Music, etc) is something to consider. However, there may be workarounds or solution to this roadblock that we’re yet to see. Time will tell.
Huawei is set to unveil the Huawei Mate 30 and GT Watch 2 on 19 September, with the live event being streamed on Huawei’s official website.
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