No Honeycomb For Smartphone

Google's Android 3.0 or "Honeycomb" is a tablet-only OS for now, a Google spokesman said Wednesday.

Somewhat oddly, Google ended the launch of Honeycomb and its Web store without entertaining questions from journalists.

However, a company spokesman answered one question, and raised others. When asked if Android 3.0 would also appear on phones immediately, spokesman Andrew Kovacs said no. "Features will arrive on phones over time," he said.

"The version of Honeycomb we've shown is optimized for tablet form factors," Kovacs added, via a followup email. "All of the UI changes are the future of Android. Yesterday's event focused on tablet form factors, which is where you'll first see Honeycomb."

Kovacs didn't elaborate, but that might be because the design and layout of Android 3.0 is optimized for tablets. Although the interface is austere, the format takes advantage of the broad format of the tablet. Individual services - the browser, for example, has Incognito private-browsing windows and tabbed browsing, like Chrome - work in the tablet space, but wouldn't be as conducive to smartphones with smaller screens.

And, for now, of course, Google's some of developers are claiming that the Honeycomb performance on the Motorola Xoom far surpasses the Apple iPad.