Online poll shows more people regularly use Chromebooks than you may think

We’re Chromebook advocates around here. There are probably few statements that exist that are so obviously true. But even our fandom of ChromeOS doesn’t detach us from the reality that there are still wide swaths of laptop users that either choose not to use a Chromebook on a daily basis or simply don’t even know about it as a legitimate option.

Sometimes those realities hit harder than others, and I’m forced to reconcile the fact that I’ve been spreading the ChromeOS gospel for nearly a decade and there are simply a lot of people that aren’t interested. That’s OK and that’s part of why we do what we do, but there are days when that reality is tough to deal with and part of me just wants to stop my contrarian ways and go with the flow. Those days are few, but they are there, and when I see articles like this latest one from Android Authority, I’m just plain happy about it.

In a poll of their readers (they have many), Android Authority simply asked how often those readers used a Chromebook in 2022. The answer options were simple: Yes, all the time; Yes, from time to time; Only rarely; and No. And if you were to have asked me to predict this chart, it would look nothing like what we see above. Instead, the ‘Yes, all the time’ crowd would have been the smallest with the ‘No’ crowd taking the cake. Call me cynical, but I’m a bit shocked by the results.

From comments we see on videos and on our website, there are simply a lot of trolls out there that don’t want to see ChromeOS succeed and can’t help themselves from pointing out the shortcomings of Chromebooks without taking the time to try them out and see the benefits for themselves. After years of fighting these arguments, I suppose I’ve become a bit salty about it and resigned myself to fighting for Chromebooks for a lot longer than I thought I’d have to.

However, what we’re seeing in this poll of 1600 or so readers of an Android website is that just over 75% of them use a Chromebook and a majority of those polled use Chromebooks regularly. Those numbers would skew in another direction on an Apple or Windows blog, sure, but it is really encouraging to see Android users beginning to take up Chromebooks as regular-use devices.

What it also means is general consumers are finally starting to get on board the ChromeOS train, too. We know education and enterprise are huge areas for Chromebooks, but the general consumer sector has always lagged a bit behind when it comes to Chromebook adoption. This poll has me feeling like that tide might finally be turning and that with some of the sweet devices coming in 2023 (we can share soon), we could see the first emergence of Chromebooks taking a legitimate hold in the consumer market.

Sure, this poll is small (relatively speaking), but it is also telling of a trend that feels like it is long overdue. I hope some other large tech blogs run similar polls in the future to gauge general ChromeOS popularity at this point. Chromebooks are so capable, fun to use, and easy to recommend that it feels like their growth in the consumer market should be a given. That hasn’t been the case just yet, but with ChromeOS more capable than ever and more great hardware on the way, my hope is that changes in 2023.