A mobile-centric app like Snapchat highlights a good chunk of the appeal here. If everything’s done well, it makes it easier to keep your endless stream of info confined to one Chromebook screen.
It’s like the convenience of having iMessage on a MacBook; functions that were once fragmented between devices now feel more unified.
This feels especially right with messaging clients, note taking apps, streaming services, or anything else you’d normally leave running off to the side, while you get the bulk of your work done in the browser. Laying that stuff out in app windows is cleaner than switching between tabs, too.
These apps won't replace Chrome as the anchor of everything you do on a Chromebook — YouTube, Facebook, Google Docs, Google Maps, and most other major apps still work better in the browser — but they undoubtedly make the OS more versatile.
Going back to Snapchat: It's not as natural here as it is on a phone, clearly, but it translates decently enough. Where you’d normally swipe and tap, now you drag and click. (This is a common sentiment.) I had a problem where the Snaps themselves didn’t format correctly to the app’s window, but again, that’s something I’d expect to see sorted out as we get closer to a genuine release.