Googlebook Review: Why PWAs Beat Android Apps and How It Compares With Windows 11

The three ways to get software on a Googlebook​

Boddy describes three routes, each with compromises:

• Google Play Store. Google's help documentation confirms you can install apps, games and content from Play on a Googlebook. Google's launch post promises millions of Android apps, "many of them" optimized for large screens, mouse and keyboard input. The "many" is the part Boddy disputes.
• The Linux Terminal. This is a preview feature and, in his view, a weak point.
• Web apps installed through Chrome. Google's help page says web apps can be found in the app launcher or the Play Store, and some sites can be installed as apps directly from Chrome.

Where Android apps fall short, in the reviewer's testing​

Boddy says most Android apps still behave like a tablet app at best and a stretched phone app at worst. His specific complaints:

• Click-and-drag, right-click and shift-click often don't work, so he fell back on long presses and swipes.
• Information density and tool depth vary widely from one app to the next.
• Some Play Store apps are unsupported, or install but never launch.
• Android apps can perform worse on x86 Intel Googlebooks than on Arm64 Qualcomm ones. The Lenovo unit he used is Intel-based. Lenovo lists it with a Core Ultra 5 325, 16GB or 32GB of memory and a 15.3-inch 2880×1800 OLED touchscreen.

Other coverage partly echoes the Intel point. Android Authority reports that Google says the vast majority of Android apps run fine, but a "small handful" need developer tweaks to run well on Intel-based Googlebooks. That is a much milder description than Boddy's "lots" of apps that fail to launch. A separate account says The Verge's reviewer couldn't install Bluesky or Okta on either an Intel or an Arm Googlebook. I haven't checked that Verge claim against The Verge's own review. Taken together, the reports suggest app gaps are real, but their size isn't established.

The Linux Terminal is still a preview​

Boddy calls the new Linux Terminal inferior to the Linux environment on ChromeOS. He lists missing windowed GUI app support, app-drawer integration, USB passthrough and dynamic memory. He also says it is nowhere near as capable as the Windows 11 Terminal's multi-distro support.

Google's own Android Developers Blog, dated October 12, 2026, is consistent with the missing pieces. It describes a Debian VM aimed at command-line work, with the following:

• Tools such as apt, git and ssh.
• Runtimes including Node.js, Python, Ruby, Go and Rust.
• Automatic localhost port forwarding to the host browser.
• An adjustable memory allocation for the VM.
• A one-click VM reset that preserves host files.
• Directories mounted only after the user's explicit permission.

The same post lists Linux GUI apps in the app launcher, USB passthrough and ADB over USB, dynamic memory and storage scaling, GPU/NPU acceleration, and VM persistence separate from the Terminal window as future work. It gives no dates for any of them. The security claims are Google's own descriptions, not an independent assessment. The ChromeOS comparison is Boddy's judgment, not a verified feature-by-feature audit.

Why the reviewer prefers web apps​

Boddy's case for PWAs is that they often mirror desktop features, are lightweight and easy to install, and suit mouse and keyboard use. His examples:

• TIDAL: the web version had smoother performance, tooltips, a large-screen layout and consistent navigation. The Android app had unresponsive touch targets.
• Asana and Slack: he says the gap was even wider.
• Pixlr: he found the web version better than the "Made for Desktop" Android app. He says no Play Store app felt better than its web alternative.

He accepts one real trade-off: you can lose offline functionality. Google's help page agrees that although web apps work offline, some may not work completely without an internet connection. The reviewer's view is that this is an easy trade in most situations. Someone who works on planes may weigh it differently.

Google's documentation also describes how web apps behave. They share permissions, cookies, site settings and installed extensions with Chrome, so clearing cookies in the browser logs you out of connected web apps. That supports Boddy's point that they act like integrated apps. It also means they are not isolated from your browser state.

Where web apps still fall short​

Boddy doesn't give web apps a clean pass:

• Thin window chrome. He says Windows 11 web apps, installed through Edge or Chrome, keep a toolbar with permissions, extensions, link copying, casting and sharing, and back, refresh, zoom and find. On Googlebook he gets a link to the app's page in Settings and an "open in browser" button, which adds a step.
• Google's help page describes a "More" menu. It says that with Chrome as the default browser you can reach app info and permissions from the installed app's top bar. So some controls exist, but the reviewer's complaint is about how many clicks they take, and that is subjective.
• The Asana block. Boddy was told, for the first time, that the Asana PWA was "not installable" on his unit. He had to use the browser or the Android app. This is a single observation, with no browser version or diagnostics supplied, so it doesn't show that Asana PWAs are blocked everywhere.
• Chrome gaps. He says Chrome on Googlebook lacks features that ChromeOS has, such as multi-user profiles. By contrast, 9to5Google's hands-on found Chrome on Googlebooks feels great, with extensions and the new vertical tab list. The two reviews emphasize different things, so test the browser features you rely on.

Google's own app strategy leans on the web​

Boddy's argument gets some support from how Google itself ships software. 9to5Google noticed that launching Gmail and Google Calendar opened web versions, which Google said were Trusted Web Activities rather than PWAs. Google told the site it asked the Gmail and Workspace teams which version to offer, and they chose the web version. Google also told Android Authority it wants owners on the "best version" of each app, and for productivity tools it treats the full desktop web experience as the gold standard. If the platform owner defaults its own productivity apps to the web, a reviewer finding web apps better is less surprising.

The counterpoint is Google's pitch for Android apps. Its launch post names Adobe Photoshop, Lightroom and CapCut as native creative tools, and says Netflix and HBO Max support offline viewing. Those are the cases where a web app is unlikely to substitute fully.

What this means for buyers, and for Windows users​

The practical question isn't which format is better in general. It's which one works for your own apps. Based on the reviewer's findings and Google's documentation, a sensible approach:

1. List the five or six apps you can't do without.
2. For each one, try the web version first and check that mouse, keyboard, drag and right-click work properly.
3. Keep the Android version where you need offline use, or mobile-only features such as secure phone-based tools.
4. If a PWA won't install, use it in a browser tab and check whether the Android app is any better.
5. Developers should treat the Terminal as a command-line preview, not a replacement for Windows 11 with WSL or a full Linux desktop.

For Windows readers, there's a wider lesson. Windows 11 has mature, browser-installed web apps with a fuller toolbar, a desktop-class subsystem for Linux, and decades of native software. Googlebook starts with a different bet, built on Android with Chrome added. Whether the Play Store catalogue becomes a reason to choose it will depend on developer investment. Boddy is skeptical, citing Google's poor track record of persuading developers to build for its large-screen devices. That is an opinion, not a forecast, but early reviews suggest the app gap is the issue to watch.

For now, the evidence supports a narrow claim. On one Intel Googlebook, one reviewer found that web apps were the more desktop-friendly route. Google's own documentation and statements show it is taking the web seriously, and its Linux Terminal is explicitly unfinished.