Except ChromeOS and webOS are both based on linux, which is written in normal, fast C.

The computer on my desk cost about $3000. If all my programs ran twice as slow, thats sort of like removing $1500 of my computer away. Could I get away with a $1500 computer? Probably. But I'm not going to be happy about it.

They are based on the Linux kernel, the userspace is mostly written in managed languages, and don't have any access to GNU/Linux.

And best of all, they run much better than folks using Electron crap for all their apps.

Finally, my phone is better than all my computers between 1986 and 2006, combined.

1980's Lisp Machines and Smalltalk would fly with 2025 hardware, JIT compilers and pauseless GC algorithms.

C is mostly fast when devs actually know their algorithms and data structures.

If you are happy to pay the cost of a garbage collector, why C at all and not Java, C#, Go, Typescript, or any of the other fine options? They’re simpler languages with better tooling and cleaner syntax. I understand Fil-C for running legacy code. But for new code, the only reason I’d ever pick C is performance and Fil-C takes that benefit away.

For legacy code that no one is going to rewrite, of course.

For new code, I would go further than that, first of all languages can have a GC and have C like performance, it is a matter of implementation, algorithms, data structures and design application with mechanical affinity in mind.

I would go for what the last OS designed by UNIX and C authors, C only gets to be used in the kernel, and some more low level drivers, everything else is managed, like Inferno and Limbo.

Many fail to realise that UNIX and C authors moved on from their original creations, improving what they saw as flaws.