BharatOS Mobile Features 2023, When will be Bharat Operating System available in India? Can Bharat OS replace Android and iPhone OS in the future?
India has been developing its own operating system for a long time. A startup associated with IIT Madras recently presented a new project named BharOS. This Made in India operating system is created on the base of Android. This software was tested by Union Minister of Communications, Electronics and Information Technology and Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan as well.
Union Telecom Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw was also present on the occasion. The ministers congratulated the team behind the Bharat Operating System. For the past few days, there have been a lot of discussions around security, stability, and the future of this new operating system.
This is not a new operating system in itself. At the level of technology, it is very similar to Android. In a way, it can be called the fork version of Android. In reality, it may have more bugs and an increased risk of hacking because the forked version will not get the support of Google Play Protect.
IIT Madras has introduced a homegrown operating system this week, which focuses on privacy. As we already mentioned, the name of this privacy-focused operating system is BharOS. There will even be no default Google app on it. Let’s know BharOS Features and whether can it actually replace Android or iOS in the upcoming years.
What is BharOS?
J&K Operations Private Limited, a startup incubated at the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras has developed this mobile operating system. The Government of India has officially funded the BharOS project to create an open-source and free operating system. There are no pre-installed applications on Bharat OS. Basically, it does not come with any pre-downloaded third-party apps.
Users can download the applications that they intend to use. You will be granted the ability to have a greater degree of control over the rights owned by the apps installed on your device. You can simply download apps onto your device that you absolutely need in order to access particular functions or data.
Make in India is an effort that tries to increase the usage of locally-produced technology. This product’s goal is to lessen the dependency on operating systems developed outside of India.
How Bharat OS is Different from Android and Apple iOS?
Right now all smartphones are running on Android or iOS. Concerns are repeatedly raised about how much and what kind of data companies like Google and Apple keep collecting through them. Google resorts to preinstalled apps and services. Similarly, Google’s Play Store apps also share data with third-party services.
Because the Bharat operating system is built on the Android Open Source Project (AOSP), it is relatively comparable to the Android operating system developed by Google. The fact that Bharat OS does not come with any applications already installed is the critical difference between it and Android.
BharOS can be considered more secure in terms of privacy. However, for this, BharOS will have to develop its own Play Store and create security patches.
Users of BharOS can get the applications they wish to use by downloading the.apk files for those applications from the internet. However, it is true that APK files have the possibility of containing malware, and Google advises its customers not to download any APK files. Regarding Apple’s proprietary operating system, iOS, it should be noted that BharOS bears no resemblance to iOS in any way.
Bharat OS Launch date & can it compete with Android or iOS?
The mobile operating system market is currently dominated by Google’s Android and Apple’s iOS. Through BharOS, India has taken a concrete step forward. All Android applications are compatible with BharOS. The Bharat Operating System is now being reviewed by a number of enterprises that have strict regulations for privacy and security and whose users deal with sensitive information.
Google had said on January 25, 2023, that according to the rules of the Competition Commission of India, it will allow other companies to make forked Android versions. This means that in the future, technically BharOS can get access to some of Google’s services.
It will also not be easy to convince smartphone companies to launch phones that run on BharOS. One issue is that most Android phones in India are now being sold by Chinese companies. There is no major reason why these Chinese companies will shift to an Indian operating system.
Nevertheless, the firm has not yet disclosed how it intends to communicate with smartphone users in the future. In addition, it is unknown when the operating software will be made accessible to the general public. It is not yet known whether or not the operating system will be made available to regular smartphone users in the near future.
Compared to Android and iOS, BlackBerry, Microsoft and Samsung tried to stand their mobile operating systems but did not succeed. Microsoft’s Windows Phone was on a completely different operating system and was considered very advanced, but could not bring third-party developers with it and failed. This can explain how big challenge it is in front of Bharos.