Chrome for Android may utilize remote SPDY servers to improve performance
As the main browser on my LG Nexus 4, I use Chrome for Android quite a bit. When in beta, it felt like a bit of a resource hog, but I’ve never considered its actual page loading speed slow. Of course, that doesn’t mean that it can’t get faster, as evidenced by a new feature that is in the works the mobile version of Chrome: Faster browsing speeds achieved by routing traffic through remote SPDY servers.
Other browsers already have similar features, such as Opera Turbo, which purportedly improves page load times as well as reduces mobile data usage. The open source Chromium base for Chrome has been testing SPDY servers to improve load times and reduce latency for some time, but it was just recently noticed that the feature was being built into the Android version of Chrome as well as the desktop version. Found by François Beaufort and posted on Google+, the new feature can actually be enabled now through a simple ADB command.
I haven’t yet enabled the feature since I’m mostly happy with how quickly Chrome loads pages on my Android device, but I’ll probably consider it once I begin installing tweaks on my Nexus 4. I’m still a bit skeptical about whether this kind of routing actually improves performance, though, as I’ve never noticed a big improvement in Opera. Still, I’ll be interested to see if Google really can do it better and increase mobile browsing speeds, even if it does mean sending all requests through their servers.
[Google+ via Liliputing]
