13 Ways to Make Google Chrome Faster on PC and Mobile

Google Chrome is a powerful and feature-rich web browser that many people use to browse the internet and perform everyday tasks such as reading articles, downloading files, and much more. As of March 2024, Google Chrome is the leading internet browser in the world, with a global market share of 63.87%.

However, sometimes Chrome’s performance can be slow, which can be frustrating and have a negative impact on the browsing experience.

If you’re struggling with slow Google Chrome performance, this guide is for you. Here, you’ll learn various methods to boost Google Chrome browser performance and improve your overall Google Chrome experience.

Common causes of slow Chrome performance

• Too Many Open Tabs: If you have too many tabs open in Chrome, this can affect the browser’s performance. This is because each tab requires memory and processing power to run. If you have too many tabs open at once, your computer’s resources can be overloaded.
• Outdated Google Chrome Version: Using an outdated version of Chrome can lead to slow performance as the browser may have bugs and security vulnerabilities that are not fixed in the current version.
• Chrome Browser Extensions: Chrome extensions are useful to enhance the browsing experience, but too many extensions can slow down the browser’s performance. Some extensions can also take up a significant amount of memory and processing power.
• Cache: Chrome stores temporary data and files in its cache to speed up browsing. However, if the cache is too full, it can affect the browser’s performance.
• Malware or Adware: Malicious software or adware can slow down Chrome’s performance by hijacking the browser and displaying unwanted ads or causing redirects.
• Hardware Issues: Slow Chrome performance can also be caused by hardware issues, such as insufficient memory, a slow hard disk or an outdated processor.

Basic Steps to Speed Up Google Chrome

Update your Google Chrome

Let’s start with the easy method first. Update your Google Chrome. Updating Google Chrome is one of the easiest ways to speed up the Google Chrome browser. As a rule, Google releases a new update for Google Chrome every three to four weeks, both for the main versions and for the stable builds.

Updating Google Chrome is important for several reasons. Some Google Chrome updates focus specifically on improving Google Chrome’s speed. In addition, these updates often contain bug fixes, security patches, and new features.

Check your Internet Speed

In some cases, your slow internet speed may be the reason why your Google Chrome is lagging. Internet speed can have a significant impact on the performance of Google Chrome. If your internet speed is slow, you may experience slower page loads, video buffering, broken web page content, and more.

You can use speed tools like speedtest.com to check your internet speed. No specific internet speed is required to use the Google Chrome browser. In general, a download speed of at least 10 MB and an upload speed of at least 2 MB is recommended for a smooth browsing experience.

• Open Google Chrome and enter the URL: https://www.speedtest.net/
• After visiting the page, click Go to test your internet speed. After the test, the page will display the maximum upload and download speed of your internet connection.
• You can use this tool to test your internet speed on both desktop and mobile.

Clear browser cookies and cache

Cookies and cache are the temporary files that Google Chrome stores on your device to help websites load faster and remember your site preferences.

When you visit a website for the first time, Google Chrome downloads all the necessary files, such as browser preferences, images, and videos, and saves them in the cache. The next time you visit the website, Google Chrome will download the resources from the cache instead of downloading the files again so that the website loads faster.

The cache can be very helpful in increasing the speed of the browser, but at the same time, it can also slow down your browser. Over time, the cache of websites accumulates, which can lead to a slower loading time. To fix this, you can clear cookies and browser cache in your Google Chrome. Find out how to clear the Google Chrome cache here.

PC:

• Click on the three vertical dots in the top-right corner of the window to open the menu.
• Click on “More Tools” and then select “Clear browsing data.”
• In the pop-up window, select the time range for which you want to clear your browsing data. You can choose to clear data from the past hour, day, week, month, or all time.
• Make sure that the boxes next to “Cookies and other site data” and “Cached images and files” are checked.
• Click on the “Clear data” button to clear your browsing data.

Android:

• Open the Google Chrome browser on your PC, click on the three-dot menu in the top right corner, and tap on settings.
• Click on the Privacy and Security tab and click on the clear browsing data.
  

  

  

• Now select browsing history, cookies and site data, cached images, and files, and click on the Clear data button below.

In addition,  you can also set your browser to clear them when you close the browser automatically. Here’s how to do it in Google Chrome:

1. Click on the three vertical dots in the top-right corner of the window to open the menu.
2. Click on “Settings.”
3. Scroll down and click on “Privacy and security.”
4. Under “Cookies and other site data,” select “Clear cookies and site data when you quit Chrome.”
5. Toggle the switch to the on position.

Use Performance Mode

In response to Google Chrome’s performance problem, Google recently introduced a new performance mode feature for the Google Chrome desktop web browser. The performance mode is primarily intended to improve battery life and limits the memory usage of Google Chrome tabs when they are open.

Both memory saver and energy saver in the new performance features are enabled by default on the devices running on Google Chrome version 110 or above. You can also manually enable this feature by clicking on the three-dot menu → More tools → Performance → toggle on Memory Saver and Energy Saver. Alternatively, you can also find it by going to the main settings → Performance tab.

Close unused Browser tabs

Closing unused browser tabs is a simple but effective way to improve the performance of Google Chrome. Every new tab opened by Google Chrome consumes more memory. On average, 15 active open tabs in the Google Chrome browser can take up to 1 GB to 2 GB of memory, depending on the media content.

Here are some tips for closing unused tabs in Google Chrome:

1. Figure out which tabs you need and which ones you can close. If you have a lot of tabs open, it can be helpful to group them by task or topic to make it easier to see which ones you need. You can use Google Chrome extensions like Tabius to group tabs together.
2. Close tabs that you no longer need. This includes tabs that no longer load or that you haven’t used in a while.
3. Use bookmarks to save important tabs for later. If you have tabs that you want to return to later, you can save them as bookmarks instead of leaving them open. Open the web page you want to bookmark → click on the star icon in the address bar at the top of the screen.

Use Adblocker

Nowadays, almost every website contains ads. A piece of JavaScript is placed in various places on the website. These scripts often require additional server requests and downloads, which can increase the overall size of the file and the loading time of the website.

To fix this, you can use an ad blocker. An ad blocker prevents ads from being displayed on a website. It blocks all requests to the ad server and sometimes blocks scripts from loading.

How to use an ad blocker on Google Chrome

Desktop

The easiest way to use an ad blocker on the desktop is to install an ad blocker extension. This is the easiest and most convenient way to block ads on desktop browsers.

• Open the Google Chrome Web Store.
• Search for the Adguard ad blocker extension and add it to Google Chrome by clicking on the Add to Chrome button.
• That’s it; you can pin the extension to configure the settings.
• Ads on sites will be automatically blocked once you add the extension to Google Chrome.

Mobile

You cannot use extensions on mobile phones. Instead, you can install an ad blocker app or instead change your DNS to adguard.dns.com.

Most websites, including TechPP, rely on advertising revenue. Using ad blockers can have a significant impact on revenue, especially for smaller websites and independent publishers.

Stop videos from auto-playing

Many websites now also offer autoplay videos to attract users’ attention and generate additional revenue through video ads. These videos can be a good addition for more engagement on the website, but they can also cause the website to load slowly and affect browser performance.

Luckily, you can easily turn off the autoplay feature of videos on websites. Google Chrome used to have built-in settings to stop auto-playing video and audio. But this setting has now been removed. Instead, you can use the AutoplayStopper extension to get the same result.

You can add the extension to Google Chrome, and that’s it. The extension automatically blocks videos from playing on any website. It keeps track of how many videos are blocked and also sets a whitelist for specific websites.

Block Trackers

Trackers on websites are scripts or codes that collect information about users’ browsing behavior. There are different types of web trackers, including analytics, advertising, social media, session trackers, and more.

Almost every website now uses trackers to collect information about the user. You can easily remove trackers from any website using the extensions like Disconnect. Simply add the extension to Google Chrome, and the extension will automatically block the website trackers for you.

Use the Page Preload option

Preloading, also known as prefetching, allows Google Chrome to load website resources such as images, videos, and other scripts before a user visits the page. This can improve the overall speed and performance of the Google Chrome browser by reducing the loading time of the website.

You can enable Google Chrome’s page loading features in Settings by clicking on the three-dot menu at the top right of the window → Settings → Privacy and security → Cookies and other site data → enable Preload pages for faster browsing and searching

Advanced Steps to Optimize Google Chrome

So far, we’ve seen the basic methods for improving the speed of Google Chrome. Now, we come to the advanced techniques where we dive deep into Google Chrome settings and other areas to improve Google Chrome’s speed.

Disable Google Chrome Extensions

Extensions are add-ons that help Google Chrome to extend its functions. The number of extensions you can load into the Google Chrome browser is unlimited. Depending on your needs, you can load as many extensions as you want. The problem is, however, that the more extensions, the more resources are required.

This can be a problem, especially if you are running out of storage space on your device. To fix this, all you have to do is remove the unwanted extensions from Google Chrome. You can easily remove the extensions from Google Chrome by following the steps below.

• Open the Google Chrome browser on your PC.
• Click on the three-dot menu in the top right corner of the browser window.
• Move the mouse over “More tools” and then click on the extensions.
• You will be taken to the extensions page, where you will see a list of all the extensions installed in your Google Chrome.
• Now, find the extensions you no longer need and remove them.
• If you want to remove several extensions at once, you can reset Google Chrome: To reset Chrome, type chrome://settings/reset in a new tab and then press Enter. On the screen that appears, click Reset settings to original defaults.

Use Google Chrome Extensions

Not all Google Chrome extensions are designed to slow down the Google Chrome browser. There are a few Google Chrome extensions that make Google Chrome faster. Various extensions are designed to make different aspects of Google Chrome faster. Here are the best extensions for Google Chrome that make it faster.

• FasterWeb: This extension preloads the websites you want to visit. FasterWeb is smart enough to understand your browser preferences and preload web pages for faster loading times.
• AMP browser extension: AMP, also known as Accelerated Mobile Pages, was developed by Google to increase the loading speed of websites on mobile phones. With this extension, you can activate AMP pages on the desktop. With AMP pages, the website can load up to 300-400% faster.
• Webboost: With this extension, you can load key elements of the website and speed up loading times.
• The Great Suspender: With The Great Suspender extension, you can suspend all tabs that are not currently in use. When you activate this extension, unused tabs are removed from memory. When you call up the tab again, it is automatically reloaded.

Run a Malware scan

Sometimes, malware and viruses can cause Google Chrome to run slower. Malware can affect your system in many ways, such as slowing down your computer and web browser. If your device is infected with malware, it can significantly affect the performance of Google Chrome. To fix the problem, you can scan the entire device and remove any malware.

You can scan your computer with antivirus software. There is a whole range of free antivirus software that you can use for free. My personal favorite is Kaspersky Cloud Antivirus. You can download it for free, scan your computer, and remove malware.

Use experimental features

Experimental features or simply Google Chrome flags are not available by default. These are experimental or beta features that Google currently tests on the Chrome operating system or Chrome browser. There are many Google Chrome extensions that are specifically designed to improve the performance of Google Chrome.

• Experimental Quic protocol: QUIC (Quick UDP Internet Connection) is a new internet protocol developed by Google to make HTTPS traffic faster, safer, and more efficient. You can enable QUIC Flag by going to Chrome://flags/#enable-quic
• Parallel Downloading: If you are specifically looking to increase the downloading speed on Google Chrome, you can enable the parallel downloading flag. It splits the downloading file into multiple parts, and the downloader establishes multiple connections to different servers to download the files. This significantly increases the downloading speed on the Google Chrome browser. To enable parallel Downloading on Google Chrome, you can visit Chrome://flags/#enable-parallel-downloading
• Back Forward Cache: As the name suggests, Chrome automatically creates a cache for every site you visit. This will help users navigate between sites faster and enable them to load sites instantly. To enable back forward Cache, Chrome://flags/#back-forward-cache
• GPU rasterization: GPU rasterization uses GPU to perform tasks on the Google Chrome browser. If your PC has a powerful GPU, you can enable this flag to allow the GPU to perform a few tasks. To enable GPU rasterization, you can visit Chrome://flags/#enable-gpu-rasterization

How to enable Google Chrome Flags

• Go to the Google Chrome flags page by visiting this URL: Chrome://flags.
• Enter the name of the flag and find it. You can directly click on the links that we mentioned in the last section of the paragraph to visit directly.
• Once you are in, Click on the drop-down menu and select enabled.
• Now Chrome prompts you to restart the Google Chrome browser. Click on the Relaunch. The flag will be enabled, and Google Chrome will restart.

Reset Google Chrome

If the above steps don’t make your Google Chrome browser fast, reset Google Chrome and start over. To be on the safe side, we recommend that you synchronize your Google Chrome browser data with your Google account.

To sync, open Google Chrome → go to settings → click on the Turn on Sync Button → log into your Google account (if you are not logged into your Chrome profile, a login page will appear) → turn off Sync → click on the Manage Sync under Sync section → finally enable Sync Everything.

Here is what happens when you reset your Google Chrome browser

• History: All browsing history will be deleted, and you’ll not be able to recover it after resetting your Google Chrome.
• Browser settings: The browser will be reset to its default settings. All your customizations, including your homepage, search engine, and home pages, will be removed and reset to the default settings.
• Cookies and site data: All cookies and website data, including your Google Chrome browser login information, preferences, and other settings, will be deleted.
• Extensions and themes: All installed Google Chrome extensions and themes will be disabled and will need to be manually re-enabled after resetting Chrome.
• Bookmarks: All bookmarks will be removed.

Maximize Your Browser Speed with Chrome Hacks

Google Chrome is the most popular browser. With a market share of more than 74%, it is one of the leading and most widely used browsers. The biggest problem people complain about with Google Chrome is memory usage and slow loading. We hope that the methods presented here will help you increase the speed of the Google Chrome browser on your device and improve the overall experience.

FAQs about Speeding up Google Chrome

1. What is the most common cause of slow Chrome performance?

There can be many causes of slow Chrome performance. The most common issues include the opening of multiple tabs, using an outdated Google Chrome version, hardware limitations, and more.

2. Can too many browser extensions cause Chrome to run slowly?

Yes, having too many browser extensions can slow the performance of Google Chrome.

3. Can I speed up Chrome by using a different operating system?

Yes and No. It also depends on the hardware specifications and also the level of optimization. Generally, the Google Chrome browser is faster on the Mac compared to Windows. However, it is not totally true that if you have a high-end Windows machine, you can easily beat Mac speeds.

4. How do I know if I need to upgrade my computer to improve Chrome’s performance?

Here are the minimum requirements to run the Google Chrome browser. If you think your device does not meet this specification, it’s time for you to upgrade.

• Operating System: Google Chrome browser is compatible with Windows, macOS, Linux, Chrome OS, Android, and iOS.
• Processor: For Windows, macOS, and Linux, a processor with a speed of 1 GHz or higher is recommended. For Android and iOS, a processor with a speed of 1.5 GHz or higher is recommended.
• RAM: For Windows, macOS, and Linux, at least 2 GB of RAM is recommended, and for Android and iOS, at least 1.5 GB of RAM is recommended to run smoothly.
• Hard Disk Space: At least 16 GB of free hard disk space is recommended for all operating systems.

For more information, you can check Google Chrome Browser’s official requirement page. 

5. How often should I clear my browsing data and cache to keep Google Chrome running smoothly and quickly?

There is no exact timeline, but you can clear your browsing data and cache every two to three weeks. Also, clear it if you visit unfamiliar websites and when Chrome becomes slow or unresponsive.