Google Chrome is a famous RAM hog with many a user suffering from computer slow down whenever they have a few too many Chrome tabs open on their browser. It’s not all bad though with Chrome and Google has released details of an update that is trying to reduce CPU usage rather than RAM usage, as it will offer an extremely useful benefit for Chrome users. Namely, it will extend battery life. Let’s check it out.
Google has been working to cut Chrome’s intensive resource utilization for a while now. We are currently on Google Chrome version 103, and it was way back in Chrome 86 when Google introduced the Intensive Wake Up Throttling feature that would prevent idle tabs from constantly being woken up once they’d been hidden from view for more than 5 minutes. The feature was a direct response to the problems outlined above, but it also heavily reduced Chrome’s CPU usage and extended battery life on the devices running Chrome by up to 1.25 hours.
Now, back in the present, with Chrome Devs testing out Chrome version 105, it looks like Google is extending the feature considerably by cutting that 5-minute wait period to a mere 10 seconds. The update is called Quick Intensive Timer Throttling. In a note on the updated feature, Google says:
“The JS timer Intensive Wake Up Throttling (Doc) feature has been shipped in 86, which will align the timer wake-ups to 1-minute interval after a grace period of 5 minutes. The 5 minutes timeout is very conservative and was chosen to allow a launch of Intensive Wake-Up Throttling with minimal regression risk. So now we’re considering reducing the timeout to 10 seconds, only for pages considered loaded when they are hidden.”
Basically, Google has said that the original implementation was a little conservative and no it feels much more comfortable giving it a much more aggressive and therefore efficient grace period.
If you have ever been frustrated by Chrome slowing down your device or hogging all your battery, then this is big news for you. However, this is still a couple of Chrome versions away as we are yet to receive Chrome 104. Be patient, however, and stay tuned in with us as we will keep you up to date with all the latest Google Chrome news.
