Huawei’s Harmony OS is here and it’s ready to take on Android

Huawei has finally unveiled its ‘Android replacement’ first party operating system (OS), called Harmony OS (previously known as HongMeng). Only, it is no more an Android replacement than it is an iOS replacement. Harmony is a brand new OS, and we should give it a chance. 

Harmony OS and its new user interface, EMUI 10, was unveiled at Huawei’s developer conference in China last week. The newly developed in-house OS was pushed in a bid to reduce its reliance on American-owned Google’s Android. You know, after the Chinese phone maker was placed on the US Entity List, rendering them unable to trade with any US companies. 

Ready when you are

Although the ban has temporarily been lifted, and US pres. Trump made comments about removing the company from its Entity List at the G20 Summit in Japan earlier this year, Huawei is playing it safe. It has been working on its own proprietary OS for many years, but the recent sanctions pushed it to finalise development and get the OS market-ready.

According to Huawei, its Harmony OS was developed to power smartphones, watches, car infotainment, laptops, internet of things and smart home devices, among other things. When will we see it? Harmony OS rolled out on its first commercial device, the Honor Vision TV last week following the conference. 

We’re waiting in anticipation to see whether Huawei decides to launch its upcoming Mate flagship range running on Harmony OS. We’ll have to see if the US ban continues. Richard Yu, CEO of Huawei’s Consumer Business Group said that it intends to continue to use Android moving forward for its smartphones but if not, Huawei is capable of rolling out its new OS within two days.

Source: xda-developers