Chromebook tablets need two ChromeOS changes to be truly great

In preparation for the official release of the Pixel Tablet just around the corner, I’ve been doing a bit more research on Android tablets in general. I’ve used the OnePlus Pad (a friend has one), I’ve toyed with Samsung tablets, and I’ve messed around with Apple’s latest take on iPadOS. And after using these devices for just a little bit, I found myself wondering why – in tablet mode, at least – these devices feel better to use than a Chromebook tablet.

After all, the gesture controls on ChromeOS in tablet mode have become quite good, and with Android app support and a real desktop available to the user whenever it is needed, ChromeOS would seem like the better choice for anyone looking for a tablet for both consumption and production.

In standard fashion, I even pulled out the couple of Chromebook tablets we have around the office, got them updated, and proceeded to really check out ChromeOS on tablets once again. Within just a few minutes, however, I was quickly reminded why I don’t enjoy Chromebooks in tablet mode and it has everything to do with the home screen.

Again, ChromeOS has become pretty delightful to navigate in tablet mode. With the new additions of split-screen snapping, you can move around the OS with some responsive gestures and simple UI tweaks that have really become fun to use. But to start using any of that stuff, you have to go through the home screen, and as it currently stands, that is where the entire experience falls apart.

Two fixes need to happen to the home screen for ChromeOS tablet mode

No one ever liked the pages-of-apps approach Apple took with the iPad. It looks bad, it isn’t really very functional, and it feels claustrophobic. And in trying to decide what to do with the app launcher on Chromebooks, Google clearly decided this approach was the right one. I’ve never liked it, but after using other Android tablets a bit, I completely and utterly hate it now.

Minimizing apps and windows should always make way for a clean, functional home screen. Even Apple has finally relented to this as iPhone and iPad home screens are not just an app grid any longer. At some point, you need to be able to anchor your experience to a home screen that doesn’t feel cluttered with all sorts of stuff, and ChromeOS fails miserably at this.

And not only does it not feel good to use, it looks awful as well. The iPad and iPhone at least figured out a way to make pages of apps not look so bad, but Google has yet to crack that code. The home screen on ChromeOS with all the apps in your face looks half-baked and flat-out ugly. It feels messy, it isn’t a great way to see all your apps, and all I want to do when I see it is close the app drawer. Which you cannot do.

So that’s the first thing that needs to go away. Give us a proper home screen and if you insist on it being pages of apps, please at least make it look better. While the app launcher on the desktop mode of ChromeOS is gorgeous, the home screen/app tray in tablet mode simply looks forgotten.

But if you remove the app drawer, what will the home screen be? Just an empty desktop? Well, yeah, and while I’d rather see that than all my apps strewn all over the screen at all times, I think there’s a far better option right in front of the collective faces of Google’s ChromeOS UI team: widgets. It is time for home screen widgets and desktop-pinned apps. I know it’s a Windows and Mac thing, but it’s something that has been around for years and years and ChromeOS flat-out needs it.

The home screens could simply mirror your virtual desks, and wherever you pin an app or a widget, that’s the home screen those things will still be on when you flip into tablet mode. Listen to me Google: it’s time to start leveraging the vast, unused area known as the desktop, and it will help the tablet mode look less goofy and feel far more usable and approachable.

And as an added bonus, if there is a true desktop and home screen, that means the excellent app launcher from the desktop mode could be repurposed for tablet mode, too. With the OnePlus Pad and Pixel Tablet, I love the look of the app launcher, and I can’t help but think it looks just like the one we already have with ChromeOS. From every point of view, everything makes far more sense with an app launcher instead of all the apps you have installed being poured out all over the home screen.

And to start, Google could limit the widgets to in-house stuff: weather, calendar, clocks, news, etc. If we had those widgets, some pinned apps, and multiple home screens/virtual desks, the entire ChromeOS tablet experience would feel revolutionized. There are so many things ChromeOS tablets are great at, but for now, the tablet part feels half-baked because of the screen you always end up having to look at. Giving users a proper home screen with widgets and an app drawer would go a long way towards fixing that, and if these new ChromeOS tablets on the way are as great as we expect, I’d sure love to see Google do a bit of course correction before they arrive.