Google’s Chrome is an excellent web browser; it is fast with a clean and simple interface. For the past month I’ve been using Chrome as my default web browser to compare its performance to Firefox (my regular browser). Chrome has some bugs still left to shake out (it is a browser in development) but very polished which is more than I expected. Chrome handles JavaScript faster than Firefox, although with bugs are seen heavily with some JavaScript intensive applications (such as Plurk). Comparing system memory and resources, I have some mixed results, compared to the current release of Firefox (3.0) Chrome uses slightly less system resources, although the upcoming version of Firefox (3.1) appears to change that fact. The real difference between the two browsers when comparing memory and system use is Chrome’s multi-processes architecture, a feature I expect (and hope) Firefox will adopt in the future.
While I enjoy using Chrome, I keep coming back to Firefox, although many of Chrome’s features are very innovate (some you can mimic through extensions). There are a few issues I have with Chrome such as: weak support for RSS integration (such as Firefox’s Live Bookmarks), non-keyword bookmarking and lack of a bookmark export, poor support with streaming Windows Media Files (a symptom Firefox suffers from occasionally, not nearly as bad as Chrome) and its lack of add-on and extensions (although they are planned).
Chrome pushes a lot of innovative advances to the web browser it lags slightly behind Firefox as the browser to use (no one should be using IE). However, Chrome is still in development and very young compared to Firefox. If the current development is any indication of what is to come, Chrome may and should take over as a dominant browser (provided Firefox remains stagnant).
Google Chrome is the next milestone to the web browser experience, a fact that Google would like for you to believe (based on their recent web comic). It is a fact I believe as Chrome is an important milestone, akin to the milestones of the Mozilla/Firefox browser. Historically each step provides a new feature that changes the web experience, the first milestone was the browser itself then graphics followed by JavaScript, flash, and ActiveX. Recent milestones have concerned the software, Firefox becoming extension based, tougher on security, fast, and open-source. Chrome seems to be the next step, turning the browser into a tighter, well knit application.
Chrome may compete with Firefox for the none IE web browser market, but it really lies the groundwork for the next evolution of web browsers, bridging the gap between where the web browser ends and where applications begin. Some of the advancements in Chrome seem to mirror some Mozilla developments (such as Prism and Weave). Chrome’s true power lies in the approach of a browser, turning it from an application with extensions and separate parts for use to one application with everything embedded inside.
While Chrome will become a popular browser its developments will be mirrored in others and it will push IE to the wayside. I believe Chrome and Firefox will compete against one another but only to widen the market share between the two. I also believe that Chrome’s release will usher a more Linux approach to web browsers. Each browser built with their own rendering engine will provide different if not similar tasks. Chrome is built on the webkit rendering engine (think Safari), Mozilla build on the Gecko rendering engine. I can only imagine what’s brewing next from Mozilla as I would assume Firefox 4 will include many of the Chrome developments.
With Chrome’s release while I wrote this post, I’m going to attempt to use Chrome solely for 2 weeks. I will see how it works as an application, a development tool and a piece of software. Throughout this period I plan on taking Chrome apart and posting my discoveries as compared to Firefox. If you want to try Google Chrome, click here.
