AI PC market heats up as Microsoft, Google launch new offerings

About ten days after Microsoft unveiled its Copilot+ personal computers (PC), Google on Tuesday introduced its Google AI features to Chromebook Plus laptops. PC manufacturers such as Samsung, Acer, and Asus are new Windows-based laptops that will leverage the artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities. 

Moreover, the upcoming Apple’s developer conference is anticipated to have its own series of related announcement amid reports of its partnership with OpenAI for AI features in the next iOS version.

The battle to best each other on introducing generative AI features and levelled up to find who can take them faster to personal devices such as mobiles and laptops. Here is what has happened so far:

Google, Microsoft fight it out

As per the announcement, Google will be offering Google AI features built into its Chromebook Plus line of products. Chromebook is a laptop and tablet line by the Alphabet-owned tech giant which runs on its operating system ChromeOS and offered through partners like Acer, ASUS, HP and Lenovo; Chromebook Plus are the laptops specifically built to run AI features.  To be sure, Google Chromebook Plus is priced at $399 (approximately ₹35,000)

The Google AI features will bring access to features such as writing assistance, generative AI wallpapers and video backgrounds, and enhanced editing in Google Photos app. The bigger highlight, however, is making Gemini model capabilities accessible right from the homescreen. “We’re offering the Google One AI Premium plan at no cost to new Chromebook Plus users for 12 months. The plan includes access to Gemini Advanced, 2TB of storage and Gemini in Docs, Sheets, Slides, Gmail and more,” Google’s blog further added.

On the other hand, Microsoft’s Copilot+ PCs were announced on May 20, is being positioned as ‘a new category of Windows PCs designed for AI’. For this new range of product, Microsoft said that it is leveraging multiple state of art AI models, including its own small language models to offer features that can run locally on the device. A few capabilities are similar to what Google’s Chromebook Plus promises, which includes better photo editing, writing assistance, along with live caption generation, enhanced Windows Studio Effect, and multimodal input controls. One of the features, which caught a lot of eyeballs was the Recall feature, which is basically the device taking screengrabs every few seconds. While Microsoft tried to market it as an easy to swift through the activities on the device, many users panned as ‘dystopian’.

Microsoft’s Copilot+ PCs are priced at $999 (approximately ₹81,000).

Lastly, for the Apple’s developer conference is expected to present a confirmation on its alleged partnership with OpenAI. Additionally, as reported by Bloomberg, Apple will bring the new AI features to iOS 18 and macOS 15 — and both operating systems that will decide whether a task should be handled on the device or via the cloud. Many other AI integrations are also expected to be announced. 

Running generative AI locally

AI PCs will revive the global laptop PC market’s replacement demand in the coming years, as per an April report by research firm Counterpoint Research. Microsoft will play a pivotal role in driving the AI laptop PC ecosystem, while Apple will be a dark horse, the report further added. As many as 3 Out of 4 Laptop PCs Sold in 2027 will be AI Laptop PCs with Advanced Gen AI Capability, the findings have shown.

“Counterpoint forecasts that the penetration of AI-advanced laptops, which will form a majority of the AI laptop PC segment, will pick up in the next two years as chip vendors scale the Gen AI capability to mainstream tiers. With the proliferation of Gen AI use cases at the edge or in the cloud or in a hybrid way in the next few years, Gen AI will become a de facto and must-have capability in the PC segment,” said William Li, senior analyst with Counterpoint Research.