Yesterday we discovered that Google Duo received support for Android tablets and making and receiving voice and video calls on multiple devices. Today, we discovered that with this latest update Google has also added support for Google Duo on some Chromebooks like the HP Chromebook X2.
Our editor was able to install and use Google Duo on his HP Chromebook X2 today. This device is the first detachable Chromebook on the market, so it’s no surprise to see it gain support given that Android tablets are now supported. However, it’s shocking that support hasn’t been enabled for other Chrome OS devices like the Google Pixelbook or Samsung Chromebook Plus/Pro.
In any case, Google Duo can be installed on the device through the Google Play Store and it has the same features as the tablet version. It even uses the same user interface as the tablet version of the app. You can make and receive both voice and video calls from Duo on Chromebooks.
Since Google has not officially announced this yet, we don’t know when or if it will be making its way to other Chromebooks. We’re assuming that other Chromebooks like Google’s own Pixelbook will be able to install this very soon from the Google Play Store.
It really seems like Google is trying to push their multi-platform messaging to more users. Just last month Google Duo hit the half a billion download milestone on Android. Now we are now just waiting for Google to release Duo for desktop platforms like macOS and Windows for better multi-platform access. Google could make Duo’s multi-platform feature work similar to Android Messages for Web that was just released or make it an entirely independent client. Either way, Google Duo really needs a desktop client to compete with the likes of Apple FaceTime or Skype.
Google Duo (Free, Google Play) →