Google hits back at Microsoft with improved Chrome battery test on Surface Book

We’ve said time and time again that Chrome is a battery hog, and a couple of months  ago, Microsoft released a browser test a Surface Book that really drove the point home.

Naturally, the test was meant to promote Edge, but it also just pointed out how bad Chrome is; where Edge got over 7 hours of battery life, Chrome only managed over 4 hours in a looping video test. For overall browsing, Edge showed up to 53 percent better battery life.

But now Google is showing off some of the improvements it’s made, and testing the browser on the same Surface Book laptops Microsoft used.

According to the video, the latest version of the browser (v53) could loop the same Vimeo clip for 2 hours and 12 minutes longer than Chrome v46 could last year. Chrome 46 lasted 8 eight hours and 27 minutes, while Chrome 53 lasted 10 hours and 39.

For comparison, Microsoft used Chrome 51 in its test; it’s not clear how that version compares to the latest version used in the video. Also, the companies are obviously doing something different, given they achieved radically different battery results on a test that seems so similar at first glance (looping a video over and over again).

Still, using Surface Books in the video is clear shot across the bow to Microsoft, as if to say “you can get good battery life from Chrome.” Looping video isn’t exactly a real-world test, and Google clearly isn’t confident enough to put its browser up against the competition (like Opera did), but but it’s nice to see the company putting in the elbow grease to fix arguably the worse part about its browser.

Via OMG! Chrome!