Webex Meetings teams up with Google to release a Progressive Web App for Chromebooks

If you’ve read Chrome Unboxed for any length of time, then you probably already know what a “PWA” is. A Progressive Web Application is a website with app-like functionality. They’re becoming increasingly more popular these days, and in many instances, are replacing traditional installable apps entirely. Today, Webex, a Cisco product for video conferencing often used in large corporations is bringing its tech to the web in collaboration with Google!

Webex Meetings is built specifically for ChromeOS, and is available on the Google Play Store as so many other PWAs have opted to be in the past year. In recent memory, we’ve seen several Google services as web apps replace their Android app counterparts on the Play Store as well, meaning that the Store itself is no longer just for Android apps.

Webex users can have engaging meetings on the most reliable platform for video conferencing backed by sophisticated web technologies. With Webex Meetings PWA on Chrome OS, customers can have the best of both worlds—the simplicity of web-based technology and the robustness of local applications. Users can install it on their Chromebooks like any desktop app and quickly join meetings with one click from the launcher without opening the browser to enter the URL.

Webex Blog

Webex wants to give its users the flexibility of using its software anywhere and anytime they have an internet connection, and with a Chromebook – a versatile, lightweight, portable, inexpensive piece of hardware, a web app makes perfect sense. The PWA features advanced functionalities like background noise removal and real-time translation among other things, making it a great Google Meet and Zoom competitor.

From the IT administrator standpoint, a web app means that many Chromebooks and users can easily be managed from a simple URL, and the whole experience can be pre-installed on Chromebooks before they get handed out to employees – no hassle at all! Let me know in the comments whether or not you and your team use Webex Meetings, and if so, whether or not the PWA will come in handy as opposed to finding a Windows PC and downloading the software. I know, this is mostly a rhetorical question, but still!