Chromebooks have continued to beat iPads as the most popular new devices in U.S. schools.
So says an article on Forbes.com, further stating that “this is a huge win for Google in a market historically dominated by Apple and Microsoft.”
“According to the Financial Times and IDC, ‘Google shipped 715,500 of the low-cost laptops into US schools in the third quarter, compared with 702,000 iPads.’ Even more striking, the $199 and up Chromebooks have gone from zero to a quarter of the educational market in only two years.”
The iPad, the article said, “is the fastest-growing product in Apple’s history, but that growth is clearly slowing.”
“As recently as a year ago, Apple CEO Tim Cook claimed that ‘iPads make up 94 percent of the market for education tablets,'" the article said. "As impressive as this is, this statistic obscures the fact that tablets have not been as useful in the educational setting as promised. While Apple has been pumping iPads into schools, Google has gotten many of the same schools hooked on its free Google Apps for Education Suite.”
The article said that “once students and teachers are used to working in the cloud, Chromebooks make a lot of sense.”
“Microsoft is just now getting to the same level of functionality with its Office 365 service—but it’s free for the students, not for the school,” the article said. “Apple’s own productivity apps, Pages and Numbers, have had less traction than both the Google and Microsoft equivalents. In April, Cook complained that Microsoft’s delay in releasing Office for the iPad was partially responsible for the slowdown in sales.”
Read the full story and comment below.
Article by Kassondra Granata, Education World Contributor
|
Sign up for our free weekly newsletter and receive
top education news, lesson ideas, teaching tips and more!
No thanks, I don't need to stay current on what works in education!
COPYRIGHT 1996-2016 BY EDUCATION WORLD, INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
COPYRIGHT 1996 - 2024 BY EDUCATION WORLD, INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.