HOME HTML CSS XML JAVASCRIPT ASP PHP SQL MORE...

Browsers

Browser HOME
Browser Statistics
Browser OS
Browser Display
Browser Mobile
Browser Explorer
Browser Firefox
Browser Chrome
Browser Safari
Browser Opera
Browser Mozilla
Browser Netscape

Google Chrome Browser

« Previous

Next Chapter »

What is Google Chrome?

Google Chrome is a free, open-source web browser developed by Google. It was released in 2008, and has grown to be one of the most popular browsers today.

When Google decided to make a browser, they wanted to completely rethink the browser, as browsing now is very different from browsing simple text pages. Now we email, shop, pay bills, and run large application in our browsers.

Download Chrome

Google Chrome Statistics

The following table is a breakdown of the Google Chrome numbers from our Browsers Statistics:

2012	Total						C 18	C 17	C 16	C 15	C 14	Older
January	35.3%						0.3%	1.1%	30.5%	1.1%	0.6%	1.7%

2011	Total	C 17	C 16	C 15	C 14	C 13	C 12	C 11	C 10	C 9	C 8	Older
December	34.6%	0.7%	13.4%	17.8%	0.9%	0.4%	0.4%	0.2%	0.2%	0.1%	0.1%	0.4%
November	33.4%	0.4%	1.0%	28.1%	1.6%	0.5%	0.5%	0.2%	0.2%	0.1%	0.1%	0.7%
October	32.3%		0.5%	3.3%	25.5%	0.9%	0.8%	0.3%	0.3%	0.1%	0.1%	0.5%
September	30.5%			0.7%	11.2%	16.0%	1.1%	0.3%	0.3%	0.1%	0.1%	0.7%
August	30.3%			0.3%	1.0%	21.2%	6.0%	0.5%	0.3%	0.1%	0.2%	0.7%
July	29.4%				0.7%	1.2%	25.3%	0.7%	0.4%	0.2%	0.2%	0.7%
June	27.9%				0.2%	0.8%	17.3%	7.6%	0.8%	0.2%	0.2%	0.8%
May	25.9%					0.3%	1.1%	21.0%	2.2%	0.3%	0.3%	0.7%
April	25.6%						0.6%	1.9%	21.3%	0.6%	0.4%	0.8%
March	25.0%						0.1%	0.8%	14.8%	7.7%	0.6%	1.0%
February	24.1%							0.2%	0.9%	17.0%	4.8%	1.2%
January	23.8%								0.7%	1.3%	20.4%	1.4%

2010	Total					C 9	C 8	C 7	C 6	C 5	C 4	Older
December	22.4%					1.2%	16.6%	3.5%	0.4%	0.4%	0.2%	0.1%
November	20.5%					0.6%	0.9%	17.7%	0.7%	0.4%	0.2%	0.0%
October	19.2%						0.3%	5.6%	12.3%	0.6%	0.2%	0.2%
September	17.3%							0.6%	11.4%	4.9%	0.3%	0.1%
August	17.0%							0.1%	1.3%	15.1%	0.3%	0.2%
July	16.7%								0.8%	15.3%	0.4%	0.2%
June	15.9%								0.7%	13.9%	1.1%	0.2%
May	14.5%								0.3%	3.4%	10.6%	0.2%
April	13.6%									2.5%	10.8%	0.3%
March	12.3%									1.7%	10.4%	0.2%
February	11.6%									1.0%	10.0%	0.6%
January	10.8%										2.8%	8.0%

2009	Total								C 4	C 3	C 2	C 1
December	9.8%								1.9%	7.7%	0.1%	0.1%
November	8.5%								1.1%	7.1%	0.2%	0.1%
October	8.0%								0.5%	7.0%	0.4%	0.1%
September	7.1%								0.4%	2.7%	3.9%	0.1%
August	7.0%									0.8%	6.1%	0.1%
July	6.5%									0.3%	6.0%	0.2%
June	6.0%									0.2%	4.6%	1.2%
May	5.5%										0.8%	4.6%
April	4.9%										0.4%	4.4%
March	4.2%										0.2%	3.9%
February	4.0%										0.1%	3.8%
January	3.9%										0.1%	3.7%

2008	Total										C 1	Beta
December	3.6%										1.6%	2.0%
November	3.1%											3.1%
October	3.0%											3.0%
September	3.1%											3.1%

These statistics are based on W3Schools users.

What is different from other browsers?

Google Chrome is running each tab isolated from another, which prevents one tab from crashing another. It is also more secure, and better for the memory; when a tab is closed its memory use is eliminated.

Chrome uses a powerful JavaScript engine, V8, which makes large applications perform better.

The start page contains your nine most visited web pages, a list of recently visited pages, your favorite search engines and more.

Because it is an open source project, new features will be added, and other developers can adopt what they find useful, in their browser.

Google has made a comic on how they made the Google Chrome browser:

http://www.google.com/googlebooks/chrome/

Google Chrome 15

Chrome 15 contains a redesigned New Tab page with 3 sections: Most Visited, Applications and Bookmarks (but the user can place his/her applications in as many sections as he/she wants).

Chrome 15 also includes faster Print Preview.

Google Chrome 14

Chrome 14 strengthens the secure Web protocol (HTTPS over DNSSEC), and the JavaScript engine has been updated to V8 3.4.3.0.

Chrome 14 also offers Print Preview for Mac.

Google Chrome 13

Chrome 13 launches Instant Pages for quicker Google search results (when you do a Google search, Chrome will begin loading the first page result in the background without you knowing it).

Chrome 13 also comes with a long-missing Print Preview feature for Windows.

Google Chrome 12

Chrome 12 is now more secure, and includes support for hardware-accelerated 3D CSS.

Google Chrome 11

Chrome 11 is a little bit faster, added a brand new logo, and adds HTML speech (Chrome can now convert your speech to text).

Google Chrome 10

Chrome 10 is much faster, has new password sync features, and new browser settings.

Google Chrome 9

The most important updates in Chrome 9 are Google Web Store, WebGL for 3D graphics, and Chrome Instant which starts loading frequently visited web pages as soon as you start typing.

Google Chrome 8

Chrome 8 is here, with stability improvements, better CSS3 support, and better HTML5 support.

Google Chrome 7

Chrome 7 comes with bug fixes, and a new HTML5 parser.

Google Chrome 6

Chrome 6 is introducing Chrome Sync: Any changes you make to your browser settings will be synced to the Google Account you have used to sign in to Chrome.

Google Chrome 5

Chrome 5 is of course faster, more secure, has better HTML5 support, such as "geo location" and "drag and drop". For Mac and Linux users, Chrome 5 is finally out of beta. Also, Chrome 5 lets you use the features in the extension gallery when browsing in incognito mode.

Google Chrome 4

Chrome 4 is faster, more secure, has better HTML5 support, let's you access thousands of new tools in the Chrome extension gallery, and offers bookmark synchronizing between multiple computers.

Google Chrome 3

Chrome 3 has a re-designed startpage (New Tab Screen), 25% faster JavaScript, an improved address bar, and better HTML 5 support.

The new design of the New Tab Screen, lets you rearrange your most visited web pages by drag and drop. You can also choose to see your most visited web pages as a list.

Chrome 3 has better HTML 5 support, including the <video> and <audio> tags, which lets you play media in the browser without any plugins.

Chrome 3 has improved the addressbar. The drop-down list which shows you suggestions as you type, now shows a small icon next to the suggestion, to separate Google search result, bookmarks, or if the suggestion comes from your browsing history.

Chrome 3 also lets you select different themes for the browser.

Google Chrome 2

Chrome 2 runs faster, has improved the tab pages, auto-fill forms, and has a full screen mode. They have fixed over 300 bugs, which makes Chrome 2 more stable.

Chrome has executed JavaScript very fast since the beginning. Chrome 2 is even 30% faster.

Chrome 2 has added functionality to auto-fill forms and browsing in full screen mode, which we have seen for some while in other browsers, such as Internet Explorer and Firefox.

One great feature in Chrome is the New Tab Screen, which displays your most visited web pages. New in Chrome 2 is the possibility to get rid of pages you don't want to be displayed in the Tab Screen.

What is new since the first Beta?

It took Google 100 days from the release of the Beta version to the full version. In these 100 days, Google improved the browser, and listened to requests from the users.

Video is more stable. Users had some problems rendering videos in the beta version of Chrome.

Improved bookmarks managing. It is now easier to switch between Chrome and other browsers with the new import and export features.

Faster JavaScript. The V8 JavaScript engine is up to 50% faster than the previous version.