Google's Chrome browser loads Web pages faster
MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif. -- Nearly a year ago, Google introduced Chrome, an Internet browser that aims to take on Microsoft, Apple and Mozilla with a faster way to surf the Web.
Chrome sports a minimalist design, like the Google home page. The idea: Take away some of the fat and offer less clutter to make Web pages zip open. Since its debut, Chrome has evolved into a customizable entity, much like Google's Gmail. New "skins," for instance, let you personalize the look.
"We spend more time with our browsers than we do in our cars," says Brian Rakowski, a Google product manager. "It's nice to shine light on how important the browser choice is, and to offer new alternatives."
Google says Chrome has attracted more than 30 million users. That may sound large, but in the Internet world of more than 1 billion active users, it's actually quite meager, says David Yoffie, a Harvard University professor. "It's hard to get people to switch browsers."
Chrome has gained acclaim for speed but hasn't been able to dent Microsoft's hold on browser use. Microsoft's Internet Explorer has a 67% market share, compared with 22.4% for Mozilla's Firefox and just 2.5% for Chrome, according to measurement firm Net Applications.
To try to wean people from IE and Firefox, Google promotes Chrome on its sites and releases updates regularly. On Monday, Google began letting outside software developers experiment with a feature that syncs Web page bookmarks so they're accessible from any computer. It will show up in Chrome later this year.
This comes on top of an update earlier this month that ratcheted up the speed even more. Google says Chrome is now 35% faster than the previous version, which itself was 50% faster than the initial Chrome debut.
The new version is offered as a beta, or test. (Go to google.com/chrome and click on the link that points to the beta version.) Among the new features in the beta:
•Just type the name of a website into the address bar, and more times than not, Google figures out where you want to go and takes you right there. An "omnibox" adds a drop-down menu with suggestions for similar sites, searches and bookmarks.
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