Google's Chrome browser has historically been a heavy consumer of computing resources, consuming RAM when multiple tabs are opened and shortening battery life for heavy users However, things are changing

Not only has Chrome lightened system resources a bit, but Google is also working to make its browser more power efficient for MacBooks This should make it a more attractive browser on macOS than Apple's native browser, Safari

As a result of this effort, Google claims that Chrome allows users to browse for up to 30 minutes longer on a Mac when used in the browser's energy-saving mode The test was conducted using a 2022 13-inch MacBook Pro M2 and Google's own benchmarking tools

Now, 30 minutes may not sound like a revolution in extra browsing time, but it could be the difference between finding some important information before a business meeting or pitch or polishing the last 10% of a Google Doc before your MacBook gives up the electric ghost It could be the difference between improving

To accomplish this, Google made technical adjustments: tweaking the way iframes are processed in memory to reduce power consumption; JavaScript timers were also adjusted to wake the CPU less frequently, thus consuming less power; and the Google Google Google Web site was updated with a new version of Chrome, which is now more efficient than Chrome's previous version In addition, Google has streamlined the data structure behind Chrome to optimize efficiency by figuring out which data is accessed more frequently

In short, Google has done a lot of pretty technical things to reduce Chrome's power consumption on macOS if you want more technical details directly from Google, check out The Fast and the Curious (opens in new tab), a Creatively named blog

If you are less interested in software engineering, you should know that the latest version of Chrome uses less energy on MacBooks

The MacBook Air M2, for example, is already quite power efficient for its performance However, optimizations that allow Chrome to function without consuming system resources could be the icing on the computing cake

More details from Tom's Guide