Users Are Warned Against Sideloading Google Apps On The Upcoming Huawei P40, P40 Pro
Dhir Acharya
The Huawei P40 and Huawei P40 Pro are set for launch late this March. They won't have Google apps, and if you're thinking of sideloading them, stop!
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The Huawei P40 and Huawei P40 Pro are set for launch late this March. However, the flagships have already given consumers confusion and speculation about what will happen with Google apps and services. Will the phone have Google apps? Otherwise, can users sideload apps like YouTube, Gmail, and Maps?
Google gave the answer to these questions in one of its blog posts: No. The sanction between the US government and the Chinese tech giant, you shouldn’t sideload the apps, where you basically download or transfer apps from another device to your Huawei phones.
The post comes from Android’s legal director Tristan Ostrowski, who explains that the US government blacklisted Huawei on May 16 last year. As a result, Google cannot collaborate with the Chinese company on any phones released after that date, including the Mate 30 Pro launched in 2019 and the upcoming Huawei P40 lineup.
The post says that due to the restrictions from the US government, new Huawei phones that are launched after May 16, 2019, haven’t been able to undergo the security process at Google. Therefore, such phones are “uncertified” and can’t use Google services and apps.
In 2019, Huawei launched the Mate 30 Pro without Google’s full support, which means its users didn’t have Google apps or Google Play Store. To replace, Huawei offered its AppGallery, but of course, that didn’t come with Gmail, YouTube, or Google Maps, as well as Instagram or Facebook.
To deal with this situation, many people sideloaded Google apps on Huawei phones, but Ostrowski warned users against this. He said that sideloaded apps won’t work reliably as Google doesn’t allow them to run on uncertified handsets, whose security may get compromised. By sideloading Google apps, users may also install apps that have been altered or tampered in ways that can hurt their own security.