Google Wants More Chromebook Users: Offers Easy Access To Microsoft Services

Microsoft Office and the other applications in the Microsoft 365 suite are still the standard when it comes to productivity tools in the business environment. Google has also recognized this and therefore wants to ensure that Microsoft products are more easily accessible under ChromeOS.

With ChromeOS and the associated Chromebooks and Chromeboxes, Google has been offering its own hardware and software ecosystem around a kind of cloud operating system for several years. Of course, this also includes Google Docs and other Office tools, but Microsoft 365 with web versions of Word, Excel, and PowerPoint. is probably still dominant in this area.

Microsoft 365 in ChromeOS

So that more users can use Chromebooks or Chromeboxes with ChromeOS, Google is now integrating Microsoft services more deeply into its cloud operating system. One can already use Word, PowerPoint, or Excel in the form of PWAs (progressive web apps) under ChromeOS, according to a Google employee in a blog entry, but support should be further intensified.

In the course of the year, Google wants to introduce a new “setup experience” for setting up the Microsoft 365 web apps and Microsoft OneDrive under ChromeOS. This should make it much easier for users to use Microsoft Office applications and cloud storage in conjunction with ChromeOS.

As part of the integration of OneDrive, the “Files” app will always automatically display the content stored on OneDrive when it is opened in the Microsoft 365 app. It is still unclear when exactly Google wants to make the new integration of Microsoft services in ChromeOS widely available, but the blog entry said that all information about the launch would be published in the next few months. Before that, as usual, there should be a test in the Dev and Beta channels around ChromeOS.