Google introduced as we speak that it is extending Chromebooks’ automated replace assist from 8 years to 10 years for gadgets launched from 2019 and later. The transfer follows rising criticism from shoppers, faculties, and advocacy teams across the many Chromebooks in use and on sale with looming dying dates.
“All Chromebook platforms will now get common automated updates for 10 years,” Google’s weblog submit says. Quite a few Chromebooks launched in 2019 had been about to run out subsequent 12 months. Now, no Chromebooks needs to be expiring inside the subsequent two years.
Google’s weblog continues:
Beginning in 2024, if in case you have Chromebooks that had been launched from 2021 onwards, you’ll robotically get 10 years of updates. For Chromebooks launched earlier than 2021 and already in use, customers and IT admins could have the choice to increase automated updates to 10 years from the platform’s launch after they obtain their final automated replace.
Ten years of assist is a notable achievement for Chromebooks, which are sometimes budget-priced. The common Mac receives seven years of macOS updates. Home windows, in the meantime, normally sees 10 years of updates, however you may set up Home windows (and replace it) on gadgets from as way back because the late 2000s. Chromebooks are distinctive in particular person fashions having automated replace expiration (AUE) dates and have confronted criticism for this for years.
Elizabeth Chamberlain, director of sustainability at iFixit, instructed Ars Technica:
Basing replace and repair timelines on first manufacture date as an alternative of final new sale date is a essentially flawed mannequin. It permits for the terrible chance that somebody may purchase a brand new retail product with expired safety assist, which ought to by no means occur.
By some means, Google discovered a manner
Google’s announcement comes about three years after it introduced that Chromebooks’ extension of automated replace assist from 5 years to eight. It additionally follows the US Public Curiosity Analysis Group’s (PIRG’s) “Chromebook Churn” report in April [PDF] stating that the common Chromebook solely had 4 years of updates left. On the time, 64 Chromebook fashions had been scheduled to run out by the tip of summer time 2024.
By together with interviews with restore techs, restore activists, and US faculty districts that helped surge Chromebook gross sales through the COVID-19 pandemic, PIRG’s scathing report detailed issues with Chromebook AUEs, together with views that they had been “arbitrary” and “aggressive.” PIRG referred to as for Google to vow 10 years of assist.
Nevertheless, Google has beforehand stated that AUE dates aren’t simple to alter as a result of the dates “rely upon many system particular, non-Google {hardware} and software program suppliers that work with Google to supply the best degree of safety and stability assist,” which is why “older Chrome gadgets can not obtain updates indefinitely to allow new OS and browser options.”
An August Wall Road Journal report quoted ChromeOS product supervisor Forrest Smith saying AUE dates exist in relation to vendor assist for the laptop computer’s parts and that the “dates aren’t arbitrary.”
A Google spokesperson instructed Ars as we speak that “a whole bunch of fashions and 1000’s of models get examined for each single replace, together with the check updates, each 4 weeks, for your complete assist lifetime.”
“Rising the time is certainly a large engineering effort for Google and our companions,” Google’s rep stated.
However the PIRG’s report introduced a lot consideration to Chromebook life spans, particularly since many public faculties and taxpayers spent cash on Chromebook fleets to accommodate distant studying through the pandemic. For instance, Washington’s South Kitsap Faculty District in January stated it anticipated to spend at the least $2.8 million to switch 9,483 Chromebooks in 2026. Colleges had been additionally involved about the price of hauling away undesirable Chromebooks, which lack the resale worth of different laptops, like MacBooks.
It is attainable that the extension has one thing to do with Google exploring decoupling ChromeOS from Chrome, which might let individuals replace Chrome (a very powerful app in any Chromebook), even after the system’s AUE date. Nevertheless, Google hasn’t made mission Lacros, (Linux And ChRome OS), official.Â
No matter the way it occurred, PIRG appears appeased with Google’s announcement, with Lucas Rockett Gutterman, director of PIRG’s Designed to Final marketing campaign, saying in an announcement that the information will make it in order that fewer laptops are disposed of.
He added:
Google and different tech corporations ought to proceed to innovate methods to decide to a round financial system and cease pressuring us to switch our telephones and laptops. The environmental harms of producing and e-waste imply we are able to’t devour expertise at this fee. Longer-lasting Chromebooks are a significant step in direction of an business with merchandise designed to final.
