Chrome for Android will now load your pages 15 percent faster thanks to navigation optimization

Yesterday, we spoke about how Chrome 99 for Mac devices, specifically those with M1-based chips just outpaced Safari according to Apple’s own Speedometer. It scored a 300 on the benchmark test and is now the fastest browser on the company’s hardware. Today, we’re going to look at how Chrome for Android is also getting a decent bump in speed. In fact, it’s now going to be 15% faster at loading pages than it’s ever been before!

Remember, Google custom tweaks and builds every platform’s version of Chrome to specifically benefit the users on the hardware they’re using. On Android, this is no different. Last year, the company reduced startup time for the mobile browser by 13% using something called Freeze-Dried Tabs.

Chrome saves a lightweight version of your tabs that are similar in size to a screenshot, but support scrolling, zooming, and tapping on links. Then, Freeze-Dried Tabs are used at startup while the actual tab loads in the background, getting you to your pages faster.

Explanation of Freeze-Dried Tabs

Additionally, something called Isolated Splits was added to improve startup times by preloading the majority of the browser’s process code on a background thread. Basically, the small amount of code needed in the renderer and GPU processes can be kept in the base module, and the browser code and other expensive features can be split into feature modules to be loaded when needed, thus starting faster and using less memory.

Today’s speed bumps, however, come with Google’s efforts to “prioritize critical navigation moments on the browser user interface thread”, whatever that means. While it wasn’t clear on the details, I still love that it’s finding ways to optimize code for performance while simultaneously considering the user experience at every incremental step.

As I said yesterday in regards to Chrome for Mac, you’ll notice that many of these improvements take time to implement and that they’re very small in nature, but that’s exactly the point. Chrome is to a place now where all of the major alterations for speed have already been adjusted, and now it’s all about using small tricks in exchange for large benefits.