Android System WebView review: the Google part you never open but shouldn't remove

What this actually is

Android System WebView is a Google component that comes with Android and lets other apps display web content inside themselves. Do not think of it as an app you use. Think of it as a part that other apps borrow.

When an app shows you a page from the web without sending you off to a browser, that page needs something to draw it. That is WebView's job. Google says it is powered by Chrome. In other words, the engine behind Google's browser is available to every app that wants to show a bit of the web.

That is the whole offer. It is a single job, and it sits underneath everything else.

Where you meet it on a normal day

You never launch it. You run into it whenever an app shows web content in its own window instead of handing you over to a browser. The app does the asking and WebView does the drawing, so for you it is just the app working.

That is also why it matters more than its blank presence suggests. When an app uses it, the web part of that app relies on this component being there and working. Take it away, or let it fall behind, and the trouble shows up somewhere else, inside an app that has nothing obvious to do with Google.

It is about as widely used as anything on Play gets. Google puts the install count at 10,000,000,000+, which mostly reflects the fact that it ships with Android rather than anyone choosing it.

How it differs from Chrome

Since Google describes WebView as powered by Chrome, it is easy to mix the two up. Google Chrome is the browser you open on purpose, for going to sites yourself. WebView is the shared machinery that lets other apps show web content inside their own screens.

So installing or keeping one does not stand in for the other. If you want a browser, Chrome or any rival is the app you are after. WebView is not trying to be that, and nothing in Google's description of it suggests otherwise.

What it costs you

Nothing, as far as the offer goes. It is free, with no price, no subscription tier, and no paid upgrade. Google does not describe any account or sign-in step, and since it comes pre-installed there is no onboarding to sit through either.

That is the right deal for a system part. You cannot judge a free tier against a paid one here, because there is only one version of the offer and it is the whole thing.

Verdict

Reviewing this is a bit like reviewing the plumbing. You have no reason to seek it out, and nothing in it will win you over, because you do not interact with it at all. But other apps depend on it, it costs nothing, and it asks for no account. That is a sound offer for what it is.

The limits are real ones, though. There is nothing here to use, nothing to configure, and how much good it does you depends entirely on the apps you already run. Anyone hoping it adds a feature to their phone, or doubles as a browser, will be let down.

Leave it in place and let it get on with it. If you want to browse, install a browser. If you only want to know whether to keep this, keep it.