Want to test your Mac’s fans (if your Mac has fans)? Download and launch Google’s Chrome browser for Mac and open a tab or two to start runnin’ hot!
Chrome is a very popular browser, but it’s also a serious drain on a Mac. It uses plenty of RAM and keeps the CPU humming. It’s bad enough that one of the best ways to speed up the performance of an older Mac is to switch from Chrome to Apple’s Safari browser.
Google is aware of the problem with its software, and it worked to make the macOS version of Chrome M89 less of a resource hog. The changes improve the way the browser handles web pages open in the background.
A new post on the Chromium blog says, “Chrome is also shrinking its memory footprint in background tabs on macOS, something we’ve been doing on other platforms for a while. We’re seeing up to 8% memory savings, which is more than 1GiB in some cases!”
“With more data from the field on tab throttling, we’re seeing up to 65% improvement on Apple Energy Impact score for tabs in the background, keeping your Mac cooler and those fans quiet,” Google says.
MacDailyNews Take: We have to use the Chrome browser to watch YouTube TV on our Macs, but that’s all we use it for because it’s such a resource hog. (Firefox also works for YouTube TV.)
To check for a Chrome update, go to Chrome > About Chrome and if an update is available, relaunch the app.
The best way to make it use less resources, is to not use it in the first place!
Safari isn’t all that efficient to be honest. I constantly see it saying that some pages take up lots of memory. I really like Brave these days. All the compatibility of Chrome without Chrome.
YouTube on Safari (iPad Pro) works just fine.
They are talking about Youtube TV which is not the same as Youtube.
My Quickbooks consultant made me use Chrome for one operation. Upon quitting Chrome, my MacScan software (love it), found and removed 12 tracking cookies, just from using Chrome for 10 minutes in one location.
I don’t use Safari because it doesn’t support webm. I never noticed problems with Chrome. But I do have 24 gig of ram.
On my Macs, I only use Safari to download Chrome, which I subsequently used to download Edge.
I am content with Safari and trust it the most.
“less of a pig”
I don’t think lipstick counts…
My family raves about Vivaldi and I’m testing it, but honestly, Safari seems to blow fans as much as Chrome on the Mac.
I was a Safari guy forever and ever and ever, and then 3-4 years ago switched to Chrome for reasons I honestly don’t recall today. Was Safari laggy, or not rendering pages I needed to see well? Weird I don’t remember, but I don’t like change and can be loyal to a fault. It was hard to leave and I still keep it in the dock.
You’re awesome, Artista Jane. I look forward to that installation. I’m an hour and a half north of you on the poor side Oprah’s town.
Meanwhile, choosing a browser, looking for a really great one feels like choosing a cell carrier in the U.S. They all kinda suck, but still get the job done. Which one is the least suckiest?
I have been a big fan of Baroque most of my life, so maybe Antonio will win me over.
I’m still mourning the loss of “The Great Suspender” extension to ownership suspicious enough to get it kicked out of the Chrome Store. I continue to wonder why all browsers don’t give you an automatic freeze option for unused tabs you want open, but not eating cake in the background.
🤷🏻♂️
Only problem I ever have with Safari is Facebook. A disaster. (iOS app much better.) Firefox, too is a mess.