Huawei’s Harmony OS 2 Promises Unity Between Devices

Huawei is pushing the HarmonyOS 2 upgrade to nearly 100 models in China. The update is supposed to offer users better features and allow smart devices to interact smoothly with Huawei smartphones and other machines. These include the Mate 40 series, Mate 30 series, P40 series, Mate X2, nova 8 series, and MatePad Pro series.

HarmonyOS is Huawei’s own operating system, which is a direct rival to Google’s Android. That said, HarmonyOS is based on unification, meaning it can run any number of devices but allow them to function as one. For example, if you want a movie that’s streaming on your phone to be played on your TV instead, then drag the smart screen icon to your phone icon.

This drag and drop functionality is part of HarmonyOS 2’s new Control Panel feature. It allows devices to talk to each other as though they are operating as a single device. This isn’t limited to single actions either. Now that you’ve managed to cast your movie to your TV, but want the audio to play on your Huawei FreeBuds 4 instead of the TV speakers, just use the same drag and drop function.

All you have to do is drag the earphone icon to the phone icon. The system understands this as a command, then reroutes the audio feed to your earbuds. But that’s not all, HarmonyOS 2’s new Task Center allows apps to operate on multiple devices without the need to install them on every device. In order for this to work, said devices need to be part of a Super Device system.

If you want to transfer a game from your Huawei smartphone to the MatePad Pro, you need to swipe up and hover to bring up the Overview Screen, and then transfer the game to your HUAWEI MatePad Pro. The devices are able to share information with each other effortlessly. You can even see the list of tasks that are running on other devices that are part of your group.

There’s also a type of preview pane called Service Widgets that give you a glimpse of the activity of any app. You can swipe up on apps to generate them. They display easy to access information or services of individual apps without the need to launch them. HarmonyOS 2 also lets you customize the size of the Service Widgets and tap any vacant location on the home screen to hide them.

HarmonyOS 2 brings to light several novel ideas that should make it an enticing prospect for people who appreciate seamless integration. The basic principles aren’t dissimilar from what iOS and Android have to offer. But what sets it apart from the other two is the simple drag and drop functionality and how individual devices can somehow function as a single unit.