Windows 10 appears to be the first platform where Google Chrome's biggest drawback will finally be fixed. This is thanks to new features in the OS that allow for better (and lower) memory usage, which could fix Chrome's longstanding shortcoming of being a RAM hog.

The Windows Latest post presents a commit post (a working description) of Chromium (on which Chrome is based). It's a bit technical, but I'll try to explain it as clearly as possible.

The Chromium post details the benefits of employing "segment heap" technology in Chrome, with contributor Bruce Dawson noting that "According to experiments with opting in to the chrome.exe segment heap on a per-machine basis, on some machines, browser and network service utility processes, etc., could save hundreds of MB," before noting that "actual results will vary widely."

Dawson also noted that the highest benefits would be achieved on "many-core machines," which likely means laptops with multi-core processors.

This change is attributed to Windows, as with the Windows 10 May 2020 Update, Microsoft leveraged application segment heap technology to "manage memory more efficiently." In fact, Microsoft's own Chromium-based browser, Edge, now uses up to 27% less memory.

As our friends at TechRadar point out, "segment heap" support has not yet been introduced, so don't expect to see changes in Chrome the moment your machine receives Windows 10's May 2020 update (which may not yet be possible ).

Experimentation with Chromium needs to be completed and done through multiple beta versions of Chrome. In the meantime, Chrome needs to work out the other bugs in Windows 10.

Once that's all done and Chrome finally becomes a friendlier citizen on the PC, Mac users like myself will wonder when macOS will join the fight to stop Chrome from taking up all of our system resources.

Of course, this raises an interesting question. Does Chrome not run as fast when you have dozens of tabs open? Or can Chrome maintain its speed with fewer resources?