If you spend an ample amount of time browsing the web, you know how quickly tabs can pile up. Even if you don’t intend to leave them open, theseChrome tabscan end up consuming a large amount of memory. Now, Google has developed a feature aimed at cutting back on your memory usage, and it could also curb your tab habit.
The company has determined that the answer to excessive tabs and memory consumption could be a Probabilistic mode (viaWindows Report). By adding this mode to Chrome’s Memory Saver, users could not only discard unused open tabs but reduce their memory usage, too.
Google claims that, according to its data, people typically revisit their Memory Saver tabs 60% of the time within a 24-hour span. With this information, the company has created a Probabilistic mode that can help Chrome predict which open tabs are safe to close in order to save memory. For the time being, the Probabilistic Memory Saver mode is limited to the most recent version of Chrome Canary. The feature can be enabled within the Chrome flags page atchrome://flags/probabilistic-memory-saver.
Memory Saver for Chrome on desktop wasrolled out earlier in 2023. The purpose behind it is to prioritize the tabs you’re actively using and snooze the ones you aren’t in an attempt to save memory. Chrome doesn’t close out of your tabs altogether, however — they can stay in the background, remaining inactive until you choose to reload them. Enabling a Probabilistic mode in Chrome could discard these tabs in the future, if you so choose to make use of it.
If battery life is a frequent concern, Google recently rolled out an Energy Saver feature for Chrome as well. With this notebook-focused setting, you can limit background activity and visual effects in Chrome if your device is unplugged. In the past, Energy Saver and Memory Saverhave not been easy featuresto spot or enable. As those who’ve enabled them will tell you, though, they’re well worth it if you’re a heavy Chrome user and guilty of leaving tabs open.
Chrome Canary is where these types of features debut to be tested before they’re rolled out to the masses. If you’re interested in trying out such features, it might be worth downloading for your device. You should be warned that, because most are still in development, there’s a fair risk of bugginess. If you’re willing to take the risk and deal with crashes, serving as a Google guinea pig can give you insight into what’s coming down the pipeline.
