Google Releases Chrome Browser
Yesterday Google released its new browser called Chrome in a beta version. The installation went smoothly and naturally you’re able to import bookmarks from your other browsers. If you install the browser you will find that there are still a few bumps along the way but all in all I think that it seems like a really nice browser.
Introducing Incognito Browsing
Google has come up with a new term called “incognito browsing”. It will let you surf the web without leaving a trace on your computer. This is not like surfing using a proxy server but merely to avoid that your spouse/parents (??) finds out what you’ve been doing. Google states that it can be used for “planning surprises like gifts or birthdays”. Well… I’m not sure that will be the primary use but anyway…
What is the Point?
It is always enjoyable when Google launches new products and often they really come up with brilliant stuff (Analytics / Gmail / Adsense). With Chrome I can understand that from a business perspective they would of course want to have their own browser but from that to trying to compete with the new Internet Explorer 8 and FireFox 3, I believe they have miles and miles to go.
If you haven’t found your favorite browser yet, then here is the list of the most popular (+ Chrome):
Chrome beta
FireFox 3
Internet Explorer 8 beta
Opera 9
Safari 3
One last thing that I would like to add is the importance of testing your website in the different browsers. You might find that your site looks great in Internet Explorer but seems a bit messy when using FireFox. As you can’t control what browser your visitors are using you will need to make sure that your site looks its best in all browsers.
Happy browsing,
Mikael
Hi Mikael,
well now that you mention Firefox 3, I must admit that I was not impressed. It is a nice browser, but i tried it on different computers now and it breaks down 3 to 4 times a day! on bad days even more. Still I must admit that I prefer it to IE.
I also looked at the new Chrome and was actually impressed just one small problem, it does not work on my computer at work, despite the fact that I have XP installed.
Bjørn, I have to agree that I am not that impressed about Firefox either. I use it at times because of some of the plugins that are great for SEO, but other than that I actually prefer IE.
I must say however that I’m not switching to IE 8 just yet. I tried it and every 3 out of 4 pages look like crap. MS has created a special button that you can click that will show pages as they would look in the older version of IE but I think that is a strange solution. I am not going to click that button 75% of the time. Then I would rather just stay with version 7.
I like that Google tells us to be wary of secret agents and people standing behind us
Chrome uses the same render engine (WebKit) as Safari, which is well known for being lightning fast. So if your site looks good in Safari, then you shouldn’t have to worry about Chrome.
On top of that the java engine is actually developed by Google in Århus, Denmark. And should be one of the fastest ones around.
It’s definately a nice browser. But personally I don’t like the way it stores and displays bookmarks. I have several thousand of bookmarks, all well organized in folders and such. And I just can’t live without that left bookmark pane.
I am sure that they are gone to do a lot more work to it. Søren, I agree that the bookmarking options isn’t all that it could be and secondly I have haven’t found the “home” button
i’ve been using Chrome for about a day now and it seems to be a lot faster than FireFox or IE… though i do miss the “recently closed tabs” feature in Firefox
I agree. I beginning to think that it could easily become my new favorite browser if they start adding some SEO addons to it. The negative side of it being so fast is that now everything else seems slow.