ARChon

ARChon (also known as ARChon Runtime for Chrome) is a versatile custom extension for Chrome or Chromium browser that can easily run Android apps straight on Windows PC and a wide variety of other supported platforms. Originally developed by Vlad Filippov as a fork of Google’s official "App Runtime for Chrome” package, this streamlined emulator quickly gathered reputation stability and offering more advanced features, such as the ability to run any Android app as a ChromeOS app.

Since ARChon is based on the "App Runtime for Chrome” platform (also known as ARC Welder), it takes advantage of getting its code processed natively in the Chrome browser. This feature is part of the so-called Native Client, a successful Google project that allows Chrome browser to safely run native code.

Until now, getting the Android emulation setup on your Chrome browser was not easy since Google has focused its effort on enabling App emulation on the ChromeOS platform, therefore marking the desktop version of the Chrome browser as incompatible with the ARC Chrome. Developer Vlad Filippov fixed that issue by creating his own modification of this package.

ARChon and its Android app emulation can become part of your Windows OS daily workflow with just a few simple steps. The emulator extension must be loaded manually as an “unpacked extension”, and then it can load Android apps using the same method… although there is just one roadblock. This extension can only load Chrome OS apps, which means users are forced to first convert their Android APK files to this format using a small “chromeos-apk” app that is built on top of the Node.js platform.

It is important to note that ARChon features no user-facing interface elements. Once installed to your Chrome browser, it becomes an invisible service that runs in the background any time you load your Android apps (which have been converted into ChromeOS apps). The process of starting apps requires users to simply launch them from the “Apps” (chrome://apps) page.

Due to regular updates provided by the open-source community, the compatibility of ARChon has risen over its original release version. However, some apps can still be unresponsive on boot and refuse to load. The apps that do manage to be loaded can sometimes experience slowdowns or crashes, while some apps cannot be accessed in their entirety because they demand the presence of other android services such as Google Apps and others. It also has a notable launch error plaguing many apps that can be fixed with a quick text file change. Regardless, this issue will prevent many PC novices to use this app reliably for Android app emulation.

ARChon is 100% free and available for download on any modern PC that can run the ever-growing Chrome Browser application that powers the internet browsing of the majority of all online users from all around the world. In addition to the compatibility with the Windows OS version of Chrome, It can also be experienced on macOS and Linux.

Also Available: Download ARChon for Mac