In the seven years since CEO Richard Yu’s infamous heartfelt keynote speech at CES 2018, Huawei has faced a rollercoaster that would shake any brand. At the height of its global popularity, Huawei was added to the US Entities list, which hampered its ability to access the best processors and technology on the market.
The restrictions forced Huawei to find alternative solutions quickly. The answer to many lies in HarmonyOS, an operating system that Huawei has been developing for years and that powers many of its wearables, tablets, and IoT products.
Despite the restrictions against it, Huawei continues to innovate and push the boundaries of smartphones. Devices like the world’s first tri-fold smartphone, the Huawei Mate XT Ultimate, and the tablet-size flip phone, the Huawei Pura X, run on HarmonyOS.
After spending some time with the Mate XT and the Pura X, could HarmonyOS be a viable competitor platform to iOS and Android? Like all things Huawei, the answer is complicated, made more so by the two generations of HarmonyOS.
A brief history of HarmonyOS
In the eighteen months following the CES keynote, Huawei accelerated plans to launch a homegrown platform and, in June 2019, it announced HarmonyOS. The platform is for far more than just smartphones; it’s designed to be a unified platform that can power all devices in the Huawei ecosystem.
Counterpoint Research shows that HarmonyOS is already the third-largest smartphone platform, with approximately 4% of global market share. More importantly, at least for the short term, is the company’s market share in China, which continues to grow and recently surpassed iOS to become the number two platform in the world’s biggest smartphone market.
Key to this growth is a focus on innovative hardware paired with HarmonyOS. It’s still incredibly capable for smartphones but can support a wide range of devices, and the unified platform approach ensures cross-compatibility. It even runs in Huawei’s first co-developed car, the AITO M5.
HarmonyOS and HarmonyOS Next are different.
The Huawei Pura X marks an interesting moment for Huawei. Previous generations of HarmonyOS came with Android libraries pre-installed on the device, making it easy for third-party developers like MicroG to help you quickly install and enable all Google services on your phone.
This means the tri-fold Mate XT Ultimate has access to the full suite of Play Store apps, including easy sign-on. It’s not as flawless as if it had been preinstalled, but it works nonetheless, and it means the experience is largely the same with some quirks.
As the name suggests, HarmonyOS Next is the next generation of HarmonyOS. One huge difference: this version was developed to support native HarmonyOS apps and ships without preinstalled Android kernels. The result? You need to use third-party app stores to be able to install and run some of the most popular apps. This is where things are familiar, but still challenging.
Yes, there’s an app gap, but it’s surprising
To understand the viability of HarmonyOS Next right now, I installed the EasyAbroad app by following this video. Once done, it offered a selection of Western apps that it thought I might want to install. There are mentions of MicroG services, so this is an evolution of MicroG for HarmonyOS Next devices. However, does it have all the key apps?
Here’s the quick summary: common apps like Google Maps, Chrome, Uber, Starbucks, and YouTube are available, as are Airbnb, Booking.com, Gmail, Pinterest, ChatGPT, and Amazon. There are others, but many aren’t available. Some examples include banking apps, most streaming services, and alternative mapping solutions like Waze. There’s no Google Assistant or Gemini app, but this is to be expected. Other available apps include Google Docs and Sheets, Google Drive, Dropbox, and Steam.
Then there are the really important apps. Social networks like Facebook, Instagram, Messenger, and X (aka Twitter) are all available. Although TikTok is also available, it’s listed in Mandarin, so it may not be the global version. Messaging apps like WhatsApp, WA Business, Telegram, and Signal are also available. Looking for food delivery apps? You can easily install Uber Eats (and Uber), Doordash, Just Eat, Deliveroo, and many more.
The previous version of HarmonyOS offered a much wider selection, yet the apps run smoothly, and the Pura X is particularly rapid at running any task. Huawei has reinforced the lesson that Apple taught the industry: if you control the hardware and the software, you can offer a highly optimized experience.
Beyond apps, this is mostly familiar and fast.
What if the app gap didn’t exist? HarmonyOS Next is still fairly new and features a substantial architecture change, so there likely hasn’t been enough time to port more apps. Assuming the company or third-party developers can bridge the app gap, what about the rest of the platform and interface?
If this were to happen, HarmonyOS Next could be a viable challenger to Android. It has many similarities with other Android interfaces, like Honor and Oppo. There’s a split control center reminiscent of Oppo, and a settings menu that reminds me of the iPhone. Huawei has been inspired by the best parts of many other interfaces, and the result is a great interface to use.
If you invest in the Huawei ecosystem, HarmonyOS will serve your needs as well as Android or iOS, if not better in some ways. Huawei’s native App Gallery has every popular local app, and the third-party app stores have even more you may want to install.
HarmonyOS Next runs on over 1 billion devices across various form factors, and with over 2 million developers reportedly onboard, it’s likely that many of the missing apps will eventually become available. HarmonyOS is already the second-largest platform in the world’s biggest market, but Android has a 64% market share in China, meaning HarmonyOS won’t surpass it anytime soon.
HarmonyOS is fairly impressive, but there is a much larger learning curve than switching from iOS to Android or vice versa. Still, Huawei has developed many processes to replace core services offered as part of GMS, and the result is a smooth platform that’s very pleasant to use. Devices like the Mate 60, Pura X, and Mate XT Ultimate will continue to ensure that the number of users continues to grow.
