A 4K Chromebook? It kind of sounds like an oxymoron.

Chromebooks are meant to be cheap and cheerful, it’s their main selling point and also why students LOVE them.

We have seen pricy Chromebooks from Google before, the Chromebook Pixel was deadly expensive, but that machine was never intended to sell (even though it did).

So why make a 4K Chromebook?

The most likely scenario is simple: because it can, basically.

And the creation of a 4K Chromebook would push Google’s Chromebook partners to follow suit and, in the process, create a range of 4K Chromebook devices.

The alleged machine is codenamed Atlas.

Word broke about Google’s incoming 4K Chromebook via XDA Developers – the site discovered a reference to it in the Chromium OS source code.

This tells us two things:

• Google is testing a 4K Chromebook (either its own or one of its partner’s) 
• And ChromeOS is being outfitted for 4K displays

What it doesn’t do is confirm that this is happening, though I can definitely see the Atlas arriving before the close of the year.

I mean, why not? It’s not like Google can’t afford to make concept devices.

Another interesting aspect of Google’s 4K Chromebook is the device’s aspect ratio – 16:9.

This is wider than the Pixelbook’s and makes things like fullscreen Netflix and side-by-side document viewing a reality. Two things that would definitely be pretty awesome.

The only downside for the device is that it does not support SD cards, which is a bit of a bummer.

Plus, Google I/O kicks off next month too.

Could we see the Atlas there? Maybe.

Google will almost certainly update us on ChromeOS, and a new, shiny 4K Chromebook would definitely drum up plenty of headlines.

More news as we get it!