Can I Use a Drawing Tablet With a Chromebook?

Chromebooks are cheap, easy to carry, and perfect for frequent travelers. They are very convenient and versatile. But what if you want to create artwork using a drawing tablet? Can you connect it to your Chromebook? Can I Use a Drawing Tablet With a Chromebook?

We have reviewed various drawing tablets by different manufacturers. They don’t work at their full potential unless you install a compatible driver. Unfortunately, most of the top drawing tablet manufacturers do not provide support for Chromebooks.

Can’t you use a drawing tablet by simply plugging it into the USB slot? Yes, it is that simple. However, you won’t be able to draw with pressure sensitivity. If you want pressure sensitivity, then you need to install drivers, and they are not available for Chromebooks.

Is there any way around this? Why don’t drawing tablets work on Chromebooks? Keep reading to find out the answers to these questions.

Check out these Awesome Chromebooks with Stylus?

Drawing Tablet Drivers

Drawing tablets are known for their pen pressure sensitivity. This makes it easy to handle challenging projects. To get this pressure sensitivity, you have to install the compatible driver on your computer.

Most drawing tablet manufacturers, including Wacom, don’t offer any support for Chromebooks. When you visit their website and look at the driver section, you will notice there is nothing for Chromebooks. Whenever you enter a model and try to download its drivers, you only see results for Windows and Mac.

Does this mean that Wacom have never offered any drivers for other OS systems? No, they did provide drivers for Linux back in 2011, but they are no longer supporting it.

When a major manufacturer doesn’t provide support for a particular platform, new brands usually follow their example. Unfortunately, most new manufacturers like XP-Pen and Huion only offer support for Mac and Windows.

What we have learned from this is that there is not enough demand for drawing tablets for Chromebooks. So, manufacturers focus on just Windows and Mac instead.

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Can I Use a Drawing Tablet with a Chromebook?

The answer to this question is no, not really. When you plug a drawing book in a Chromebook, it starts working, but it acts more like a mouse rather than working as a drawing tablet should.

Here are the reasons why using a drawing tablet with a Chromebook is not recommended:

1. Low RAM: Chromebooks are known for their lightweight design and low price. Most Chromebooks have just 4GB of RAM, which makes them cheaper to produce but means that most graphics programs won’t work smoothly on them. This is a significant reason why drawing tablet manufacturers are reluctant to provide support for Chromebooks.
2. Pressure Sensitivity: You can plug a drawing tablet into a Chromebook and use it, but it won’t be a very satisfactory experience due to the lack of pressure sensitivity. If you don’t need pressure sensitivity, you can use a drawing book with your Chromebook. However, if you need sensitivity, you need drivers, and we have talked enough about that already.

Drawing Tablet Options for Chromebooks

If you’ve made it this far and still want a drawing tablet for a Chromebook, then try to buy a cheap one. There’s no point spending a lot on a tablet, because you won’t be able to use the pressure sensitivity anyway.

A good choice could be the Wacom Intuos (which is available on Amazon) because it’s cheap and it does offer some Chrome OS support. It allows your Chromebook to read the device at least. You can perform small tasks while using it.

Additionally, if you are buying for your kids to draw things in their free time, the Wacom Intuos will do the job perfectly. Again, don’t expect it to meet professional requirements.

While they do offer a few cheap options, a drawing tablet from XP-Pen or Huion work with a Chromebook at all. They are only suitable for a Windows and Mac computers.

Best Options for Your Drawing Tablet

Basically any laptop with at least 8GB of RAM will be able to use a graphics tablet, with no sluggishness.

You could go with a mac laptop, but personally I’d say you should go for Windows.

As someone who does digital art, photo editing, etc., you’ll probably want the following in your laptop:

1. A minimum of 8GB of RAM. 16GB is the preferred amount, you shouldn’t need more unless you’re doing some pretty demanding stuff.
2. 1TB storage, which should last you for a long time. It should be easy to get a fairly cheap laptop with 1TB. You could probably get by with 500GB. (Note that this depends on what kind of stuff you’ll be doing on your computer).
3. A processor is important, but not as important as ram. Most processors will be fine with running things like Photoshop.
4. A decent screen. Personally, I’d say 15 inches should be the minimum size, but that’s up to you. try to find one that has vibrant colours. Keep in mind that you don’t have to stick with a laptop screen, you could always buy a monitor if the laptop’s screen isn’t up to your standards (that’s what I did).
5. A graphics card isn’t that important when doing digital art. It should be low on your priority list.

Out of everything I listed there, I’d say this how you should prioritise them:

1. RAM = Most important
2. Screen
3. Hard drive
4. Processor
5. Graphics card = Least important

I don’t know how much you’re willing to spend on your laptop, so here is the laptop I use below (You might be able to find better ones if you go for second hand/refurbished):

2018 HP Envy 17 Laptop – 17.3″ IPS Full HD (1920×1080), 8th Gen Intel Quad-Core i7-8550U

Conclusion

A drawing tablet is an awesome gadget that is a lot of fun to use. This innovation has changed the way artists perform their jobs.

With a drawing tablet, it takes less time and effort to create a canvas. However, if you own a Chromebook and are looking for a compatible drawing book, there aren’t any on the market right now.

View some of the best drawing tablets with reviews

Manufacturers don’t provide support for Chrome OS due to the low number of users and the low specifications of the machines. This doesn’t mean that you can’t use a drawing tablet with a Chromebook at all. However, you can’t expect to make use of its full potential while it’s attached to a Chromebook.