Google has just changed their EOL (End of Life) Policy for Chromebooks to 5 years. Now that’s a long time for a Chromebook that you probably paid under $400 for. The EOL policy is basically saying that your Chromebook will receive updates and support for the next five years. Which is a pretty decent amount of time. Definitely longer than they support smartphones for. Obviously the five years start from the moment you buy your Chromebook. So if you buy the Acer C720 today, you’ll get support through May 16th, 2019. And damn that’s a long time. Now the EOL Policy had already existed for Chromebooks for Education, for things like the Lenovo X131e, and last throughout 2018. But now we’re seeing the policy take care of consumer Chromebooks now as well. Like the HP Chromebook 11, 14, Acer C720, Samsung Chromebook 2, etc.
Most of us that pick up a Chromebook for around $200 probably won’t have it for the next five years, but it’s great to see that Google is supporting their devices for quite some time. It’s also great for schools and businesses that are going to be using Chromebooks. However, with hardware advancing as fast as it is, it’s going to be hard for Google to keep up with supporting older devices like the original ARM Chromebook from Samsung, which is now approaching 2 years. But with as light as Chrome OS is, I don’t see it really being an issue, at least not yet.
Chromebooks are a great netbook-style laptop, and they are nice and cheap. Let’s face it, you’re not going to be doing much outside of the browser on a typical netbook anyways. So might as well get a Chromebook that’s cheaper and a bit better specced, right? How many of you have already picked up a Chromebook?