Google releases Chrome for iOS platform

Chrome browser has taken great strides as a browser on our desktops. It started a journey on mobiles phones with Android. There were rumours before that Chrome will show up for iOS users.

Today, at Google I/O Chrome has been released for the iOS platfrom.

Chrome for iOS Feautures: The good, bad and ugly

Chrome app on iOS allows users to sync their bookmarks, browser tabs open across devices. Chrome app also is available for iPhone and iPad devices. That was the good part.

The bad part is it will be slower that Safari which is native to iOS platform. Chrome also cannot be made the default browser on your iOS, because Apple does not allow any other browser except Safari to be the default browser. This means if you click a link in your email, only Safari will open and not Chrome.

Now for the ugly reasons on why Chrome will be slower than Safari on iOS. Chrome was not allowed to use its own fast V8 JavaScript engine but had to use UIWebView. UIWebView is forced on all developers as a sand-boxed version of Apple’s Nitro JavaScript version. This automatically renders all 3rd party browsers a lot slower than the native Safari.

Considering how dominant Safari is because of iPhone success on mobile devices, this move by Apple looks a lot similar to Microsoft when it tried killing browsers on its own Windows platfrom to protect Internet Explorers back in the late 90s.

I still think, a lot of Apple users who love Chrome will still use it, especially on iPad, where browsing with all your bookmarks and tabs synced could be useful.

Check out Chrome for iOS and drop in your comments and views.

Link: Chrome for iOS