Huawei has introduced its new operating system, HarmonyOS NEXT, without support for Android applications.
HarmonyOS NEXT does not have any AOSP (Android Open Source Project) components, so it cannot run apps designed for Android.
The company claims to have developed HarmonyOS NEXT from scratch, including its own development environment and compiler. The programming languages for app development in this OS are Cangjie and ArkTS.
The operating system also features an integrated artificial intelligence model – Pangu Ai.
Huawei has given up a million Android applications, which undoubtedly is a risky move, but it brings the company closer to complete independence from Google and Android. At present, 200 applications and 70 games are being developed for HarmonyOS NEXT. By the end of the year, there should be more than 5000 applications available, and there should be 500,000 in a few years’ time. Huawei will allocate over 7 billion yuan (~1 billion dollars) to support third-party developers.
A closed beta testing of HarmonyOS NEXT for Huawei Mate 60, Mate 60 Pro, and Mate X5 is currently underway. The release version of the OS is set to launch in the third quarter of 2024.
