Google Chrome is my go to stable browser at the moment for my Google Pixel 3, my Surface Book 2, my work Macbook Pro, and my Windows gaming desktop. Previously I used Microsoft Edge but like I had posted about previously there were website compatibility issues but it came with far superior memory and battery management. Now there is a change in the wind with the Microsoft Edge browser.
What Microsoft has done (it appears) is to finally accept the open source Chromium project and modify their Edge browser to now support and be built off Chromium. Absolutely amazing news if you ask me (but not according to Mozilla). When they announced that they will be releasing canary (daily updates) and dev (weekly updates) channels so that people can try out their early builds I jumped right in. As of 25/05/2019 the macOS version of Microsoft Edge only appears to have the canary channel available whereas the Windows version has both canary and dev channels.
If you are on Windows 10 then you can go ahead and download the in-development Microsoft Edge Chromium version from here.
If you are on macOS then you can go ahead and download it from here.
On my Surface Book 2 I have been using the dev channel as my daily driver while on my Macbook Pro I have been using the canary channel. Initial impressions are positive (except for an update that happened mid week that caused my Edge browser to not launch at all on my Macbook Pro – but that did get fixed quickly).
Complete Compatibility
One area that I was critical of the original Microsoft Edge was that some websites were not compatible with the rendering engine that was used, so some sites either failed to render content correctly, or render at all. Other browsers like Google Chrome or Mozilla Firefox rendered the content perfectly fine.
Using the Chromium version of Microsoft Edge gives an extremely positive first impression. All the websites render their content correctly and there has been no website that fails to render at all. It is on par with other browsers I would say from my usage so far. It is off to a good start for the in-development browser.
Fast Performance
Microsoft Edge was quick at loading some sites but was slow at loading other sites (or not at all). Other browsers were generally fairly consistent and loaded most sites quick. Obviously the loading speed of the site will depend on the content that is trying to be loaded. Comparatively the speed is on par with Google Chrome.
At the moment I found no speed or performance issues when loading various websites. So not only is the website compatibility good, the speed at which the content is displayed is quick. Navigating around the settings and just generally using the browser is also a fairly smooth and quick experience.
Solid-ish Resource Management
For a portable machine like my Surface Book 2 and Macbook Pro, managing my systems resources (including battery) is extremely important. I don’t want to travel around with my charging adapter; a good laptop should last a full business day under normal use for me.
Google Chrome has gotten better at managing the amount of system resources it uses (it also depends on what extensions, etc. you have installed) but it is still a resource hog. Battery drain has also gotten better but it can still be a problem. I don’t notice it as much on my Surface Book 2, but on my Macbook Pro it is definitely noticeable. Note that even without using Google Chrome my Macbook Pro has extremely poor battery life compared to my Surface Book 2. Overall though Google still has room to improve here.
Microsoft Edge has always been good at making sure the battery drain is minimal and even the management of your system resources is balanced and efficient. The Chromium version is good but still does not match that of the non Chromium version of Microsoft Edge. The battery life is slightly worse and seems to be using more system resources. I need to spend some more time here but from what I have seen it is slightly better than Google Chrome, but not by much.
The underlying problem could be Chromium itself. Hopefully now that Microsoft is going to be contributing more to the open source project, it can help Google and the other developers in ensuring that Chromium provides the most efficient browser for all devices. I am hopeful that this is the case and look forward to the improvements that will be made.
Trimmed and Slim
Right now Microsoft Edge (Chromium) does not have all the features of the non Chromium version of Microsoft Edge. This is expected as it is not fully released and is still in early development, not even beta, at the moment. You do miss some of the features like setting tabs aside, etc. but Microsoft did say that they will come to the Chromium edition.
On the plus side being on Chromium there is greater extension support and availability. You still cannot have all the extensions that Google Chrome supports at the moment and it will get better with time as both will be using the same underlying engine so that is a plus.
Overall I am impressed at the in-development and early release channels that Microsoft has made available. Would I use it as my stable and go to main browser at the moment? No. But once released I feel it will give Google Chrome a good run for its money because if it can perform close/if not slightly better right now in regard to system resource management and battery drain. Good job Microsoft and welcome to Chromium 🙂
Christopher Tom Kochovski 