Huawei details HarmonyOS, designed to run across multiple devices, coming to Mate 40 and foldable Mate X2 smartphones, Watch Series 3, and MatePad Pro tablet
Huawei is beginning with a shared software layer across phones, a watch and a tablet rather than treating HarmonyOS as a single-product launch. That device breadth established the base for HarmonyOS Next being positioned for all Huawei devices and, later, a PC version.
The longer arc is toward a more self-contained Huawei software stack: HarmonyOS NEXT was reported as Huawei's first mobile OS without open-source Android code, while the PC rollout was paired with work to support more than 2,000 apps.
First-order effects
Huawei can align software features and device interactions across the Mate 40, Mate X2, Watch Series 3 and MatePad Pro, giving buyers a common operating environment across those products.
Developers targeting Huawei's newly supported devices must account for HarmonyOS alongside the platforms they already support.
A common OS gives Huawei a route to make its device portfolio—not each handset or tablet in isolation—the unit of competition for customers choosing among connected products.
Third-order effects
The subsequent move to HarmonyOS NEXT points to a structural strategy of reducing Huawei's reliance on Android-derived software while building a proprietary developer and device ecosystem.
If Huawei can extend that ecosystem from mobile products to PCs, software availability becomes a central constraint on how far its hardware integration can scale.
The trend: Huawei is using a cross-device operating system as the foundation for a more independent hardware-and-software ecosystem.
So like this statement from Techcrunch is true for the IoT version, but untrue of the phone version. https://techcrunch.com/... https://twitter.com/...
Huawei wants as many devices on HarmonyOS as possible, not just apps. So from your phone to fridge to soymilk blender. A Windows PC can gain interoperability with a Huawei phone with a simple plug-in. Now: will Oppo/Vivo/Xiaomi work with HarmonyOS? https://techcrunch.com/...
Say what you will about Huawei shamelessly copying Apple, “it's an iPad but the webcam is in the right place” is a heck of a sales pitch https://www.theverge.com/...
I spent way too much time looking into HarmonyOS but I think this one paragraph tells the whole story Huawei keeps saying this is a new operating system, but they aren't even being consistent in messaging HarmonyOS is definitely an Android fork More -> https://9to5google.com/... …
Huawei tells 9to5 that HarmonyOS is not a “clone” of Android and will get an “all-new UI” at launch. Let's get our language straight here: Harmony OS is a FORK of Android. If it gets a new UI, it can stop being a clone, but will continue being a fork. https://9to5google.com/...
based on the information that Huawei has given us on HarmonyOS, it's clear that @RonAmadeo's original analysis at Ars is correct and it's not so much an OS as a skin or UI that sits on top of Android and other platforms, such as Free RTOS for watches