{"id":9591,"date":"2018-06-03T00:01:46","date_gmt":"2018-06-03T07:01:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/?p=9591"},"modified":"2018-06-02T09:36:34","modified_gmt":"2018-06-02T16:36:34","slug":"the-disappearing-android-tablet","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/?p=9591","title":{"rendered":"The Disappearing Android Tablet"},"content":{"rendered":"

Back in January, I wondered<\/a> what happened to the Android tablets. I wanted a new one, but the offerings were (and continue to be) quite thin. I settled upon the Samsung Galaxy Tab S3<\/a>, and I’m not disappointed with it, but it’s still the newest offering at over a year old. What’s going on?
\n
\nNow an answer comes, subtly, from Google itself: Gone from the Google Play<\/a> web site is any mention of Android Tablets as a device category. Android Police offers this article, Google unceremoniously removes the tablet section from official Android website<\/a>.<\/p>\n

It’s odd that Google would give up on Android tablets. Here’s what I know:<\/p>\n

• Unlike Apple’s iOS, Android never truly offered any help for developers designing apps to run on tablets. If you’ve used an Android tablet, you’re familiar with this issue: You open a game or other app and it forces portrait orientation and fills the screen in an awkward manner. They app may not look right. Or the app doesn’t work because it won’t accept any screen input beyond a given area. These are all signs that Android lacks a proper way for a developer to deploy their app on a tablet.<\/p>\n

• Google has been pushing Chrome OS, as evident by the growing number of Chromebook devices. These devices are better than Android tablets because they include the keyboard. Also, Google has slowly been adding the capability to run Android apps on Chrome OS.<\/p>\n

• Samsung is the last major player on the field. As I wrote above, their flagship Galaxy Tab S3 is the “current” model and it’s over a year old. I’ve read about new Galaxy Tab devices being tested, but Samsung hasn’t teased about anything in a long time. If they release their folding phone, it may double as an Android tablet due to its unfolded size, but this device remains in rumor-land.<\/p>\n

• With phones taking on larger and larger screen formats, the need for a tablet has diminished. I still enjoy the large size for watching movies, reading books, and playing games (especially while traveling), but beyond that my phone is the go-to device. What’s puzzling about this shifting need is that Apple’s iPad devices continue to sell at a heavy clip.<\/p>\n

• Indeed, the fact that iPads are still out there and selling well makes the demise of the Android tablet all the more puzzling.<\/p>\n

• And the silly wearable devices, Android watches, continue to sell, which will puzzle me eternally.<\/p>\n

Google may have something new up its sleeve, something to surprise us all. Such an event would be most pleasant, but seriously unexpected. I’m not counting the days any more as I wait for a new Android tablet. I truly believe it’s a bygone era. Even my publisher combined my two books, Android Phones For Dummies<\/em> and Android Tablets For Dummies<\/em> into a single title. It was a wise decision.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It had a nice run.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[8],"class_list":["post-9591","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-main","tag-android"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9591","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9591"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9591\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9594,"href":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9591\/revisions\/9594"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9591"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9591"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9591"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}