A new Chromium commit suggests that more Chromebooks with stylus support are on the way. A reference that’s made in the commit mentions “zerg system builds” which means multiple devices sharing the same build, alongside references to Wacom digitizers in the baseboards. This points to upcoming Chromebooks alongside the Samsung Chromebook Pro having support for a stylus using Wacom technology. It’s also sort of comical that the reference is using the word “zerg” to term the multiple devices, as the zerg stems from a playable race in Blizzard’s popular StarCraft RTS games that travel in large numbers.
Moving along, multiple Chromebooks with stylus support not only makes for exciting information for those who actually love the idea of Chromebooks being able to use stylus pens, much like Microsoft’s Surface tablets and Surface Book, but it also displays that Google and its partners are likely ramping up their efforts to make the Chrome OS platform and the Chromebooks that run them even more productivity focused, which could do wonders for the future of Google’s efforts in the Enterprise and Education markets. Beyond this, it would just make Chromebooks a more productive machine for anyone that owns one, so long as they have a model that comes with this type of support.
While the Samsung Chromebook Pro may be the only model close to release that will have this sort of functionality available, these details pointing to more Chromebooks featuring similar stylus technology also suggests that Google may be working towards providing full stylus support for Chrome OS as a whole, and that too would help play into Google’s efforts to make Chrome OS a more viable options for businesses, naturally, as a stylus provides accuracy that simply using your finger cannot when interacting with a touch display. This scenario would make sense as Microsoft has been ramping up its efforts with their Surface line of devices, and right now, because of the lack of stylus support, Google’s Chrome OS platform doesn’t truly have any devices that can compare in this area. That could all be changing, though, once more Chromebooks hit the market that support a stylus, whether they come with them like the Samsung Chromebook Pro or not. It’s entirely possible that next year could be the launchpad for some of these machines, but at the moment there is no way to know if 2017 will prove to make stylus-touting Chromebooks a more widely available option.