Google may halve memory consumption in Chrome 55 update

AppleInsiderAppleInsider
Posted:
in Mac Software
Looking to further streamline the multi-platform browser's performance, Google is preparing a new version of Chrome that should substantially lower RAM consumption.









Chrome 55 will employ a new JavaScript engine with a much smaller memory footprint, CNET noted. In early testing, heap memory is down about 50 percent on average, while zone memory figures are roughly 40 percent lower.



Real-world performance will vary from website to website, but the Chrome team implementing the new technology commented that it saw significant improvements for sites like Reddit, Twitter, and the New York Times.



The finished version of Chrome 55 is scheduled to go live Dec. 6, but people wanting earlier access should be able to get it through Google's beta channel. One concern in future updates is improving the browser's performance on devices with less than 1 gigabyte of RAM.



Chrome was once an infamously resource-hungry browser on Macs, performing far worse than on Windows systems. In recent times, however, Google has been able to overcome some obstacles on the platform, making it more competitive with Apple's Safari.

Comments

  • Reply 1 of 20
    longpathlongpath Posts: 393member
    About bloody time.....
  • Reply 2 of 20
    eightzeroeightzero Posts: 3,063member
    Cool. My macs are all adobe flash free, so Chrome is my go to browser to run sites that don't support HTML5 in Safari.
    longpathSpamSandwich
  • Reply 3 of 20
    larz2112larz2112 Posts: 291member
    longpath said:
    About bloody time.....
    Agreed! With the scourge of bloatware, I was beginning to think optimization was a concept that has been forgotten. I'm assuming, and hoping, this improvement is cross-platform because I use Chrome on Macs and Windows systems.
    longpath
  • Reply 4 of 20
    plyply Posts: 1unconfirmed, member
    This the most important news since iPhone launch on 2007.
  • Reply 5 of 20
    macxpressmacxpress Posts: 5,808member
    ply said:
    This the most important news since iPhone launch on 2007.
    Ahhh what????
    cali
  • Reply 6 of 20
    charlesatlascharlesatlas Posts: 398member
    What about VRAM? I open Chrome with 4 tabs and 128MB of VRAM suddenly evaporates. Firefox, my main browser, with 31 tabs open doesn't use that much. For crying out loud, Google...
    longpath
  • Reply 7 of 20
    SoliSoli Posts: 10,035member
    eightzero said:
    Cool. My macs are all adobe flash free, so Chrome is my go to browser to run sites that don't support HTML5 in Safari.
    Isn't Google dumping Adobe Flash from Chrome this year due to the security upkeep?
  • Reply 8 of 20
    holyoneholyone Posts: 398member
    I still can't stand that offensive icon, jeez Goog needs to learn design ASAP
    gilly33watto_cobra
  • Reply 9 of 20
    linkmanlinkman Posts: 1,035member
    The earliest Mac with sufficient RAM was the 512K -- we have a minimum of 4GB on new Macs. Software sure has become bloated. Developers care very little about application performance now. It's all about features, cheap coding, looking pretty, and time to market.
    gatorguywatto_cobra
  • Reply 10 of 20
    SoliSoli Posts: 10,035member
    holyone said:
    I still can't stand that offensive icon, jeez Goog needs to learn design ASAP
    Offensive how?
  • Reply 11 of 20
    appledappleappledapple Posts: 60member
     Had to look up the word "halve"  :blush:   I've never seen it written apparently.
  • Reply 12 of 20
    mdriftmeyermdriftmeyer Posts: 7,503member
    Who cares? When your browser chews through memory threefold to your competitors, cutting it down to 1.5 fold of their competitors is not impressive.
    watto_cobra
  • Reply 13 of 20
    hexclockhexclock Posts: 1,250member
    Uses half the RAM, collects twice as much personal data. 
    watto_cobra
  • Reply 14 of 20
    Herbivore2Herbivore2 Posts: 367member
    Too late. Chrome deleted and for good. No plans to reinstall it ever. Firefox, Safari and iCab are my primary browsers. Besides on mobile, I rarely fire up the browser any more. Nearly everything I do is on various apps. 

    Too late for Google to redeem themselves now.  
    watto_cobra
  • Reply 15 of 20
    maciekskontaktmaciekskontakt Posts: 1,169member
    Just stop opening new process for every session and so it will not eat up all system resources.
  • Reply 16 of 20
    gilly33gilly33 Posts: 434member
    Herbivore2 said:
    Too late. Chrome deleted and for good. No plans to reinstall it ever. Firefox, Safari and iCab are my primary browsers. Besides on mobile, I rarely fire up the browser any more. Nearly everything I do is on various apps. 

    Too late for Google to redeem themselves now.  
    How is Firefox on Macs? Was thinking about it just the other day and deleting Chrome myself. 
  • Reply 17 of 20
    maestro64maestro64 Posts: 5,043member
    they probably had to remove all the open source code to cut down on being a memory hog. This is what happen when you relay on a bunch of code which may or may not been intended to work together. This is why apple does better they write code with a specific use in mind and optimize if to ensure it is not a memory hog.
    watto_cobra
  • Reply 18 of 20
    holyoneholyone Posts: 398member
    Soli said:
    holyone said:
    I still can't stand that offensive icon, jeez Goog needs to learn design ASAP
    Offensive how?
    To the eye
    watto_cobra
  • Reply 19 of 20
    Herbivore2Herbivore2 Posts: 367member
    gilly33 said:
    Herbivore2 said:
    Too late. Chrome deleted and for good. No plans to reinstall it ever. Firefox, Safari and iCab are my primary browsers. Besides on mobile, I rarely fire up the browser any more. Nearly everything I do is on various apps. 

    Too late for Google to redeem themselves now.  
    How is Firefox on Macs? Was thinking about it just the other day and deleting Chrome myself. 
    I am rather fond of the browser. I haven't found any incompatibilities and it runs nicely without hogging all of my system resources. 

    I don't run flash, however. If a site demands flash, I just go elsewhere. So I can't say how Firefox handles flash. But otherwise a very good browser. So good that I won't be going back to Chrome. 
    watto_cobra
  • Reply 20 of 20
    croprcropr Posts: 1,124member
    gilly33 said:
    Herbivore2 said:
    Too late. Chrome deleted and for good. No plans to reinstall it ever. Firefox, Safari and iCab are my primary browsers. Besides on mobile, I rarely fire up the browser any more. Nearly everything I do is on various apps. 

    Too late for Google to redeem themselves now.  
    How is Firefox on Macs? Was thinking about it just the other day and deleting Chrome myself. 
    Firefox is my main browser, I runs very smooth on a Mac.   As a web developer I prefer Firefox to Safari and Chrome because of the awesome Firebug plugin, which is much better than the development tools on Chrome or Safari
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