Now Android apps can be run on Google Chrome for Windows, Mac, Linux and Chrome OS. Google has opened up App Runtime for Chrome (ARC) to make this possible. Previously, it was only possible to run Android apps on Google Chrome OS and it was only for limited number of developers.
To expand this to Chrome browser on other platforms, Google has launched a new Chrome app packager. It allows developers to run their Android apps on Windows, Mac, Linux and Chrome OS. The new tool ARC Welder, is a Chrome app which converts a mobile app into Chrome app and allows you to run Android apps on Chrome for desktop. I tested few apps an it worked great.
At this moment, you can not run all apps on Chrome. It was noted that apps which required in-app purchase crashed on Chrome for desktop. But we can expect this to be fixed in coming days. This ARC now includes Google Play Services which is required to for signing into Google services via Oauth2.
This is really a big step. Now developers can create apps which will work on mobile and desktop both. With Windows 10, Microsoft allows developers create single app for multiple platforms. Hence, Google is also working on same. It will be interesting to see how Android apps will take over on our systems. This will also promote devices running on Chrome OS.
