Internet explorer 8 versus chrome

husky · 08 May 2010

I read many articles explaining to me how chrome is so much faster than ie8....Claims of up to eight times faster and everything.

However, after installing chrome...nothing impressive. Everything runs at the same speed. Curious, I installed firefox, opera, safari and they all seem to run at the same speed...In fact, ie8 seemed to run faster at some pages.

Are the claims of chrome being so fast or ie being so slow overrated? (I have also tried the ie9 preview and liked it, though I cannot feel any speed difference...)

CarlTR6 · 08 May 2010

Speed is dependent on a lot of factors, eg. the speed of your system, the speed of your internet connection, the complexity and graphic intensity of a website, browser addons, etc. Those ratings you read are taken in labs with everything optimum and have little in common with the every day machines and conditions. Read those as potential speeds under the ideal circumstances.

As for real world, I can definitely see and measure a difference in IE8 vs Firefox. I cannot tell much difference at all in FF vs. Chrome vs. Opera. The initial loading of FF is slow; but after that, I don't see much difference in page rendering speeds.

nate42nd · 08 May 2010

YouTube - Benchmark your browser - how fast is it?

Check this out. With new web tech starting to saturate websites Chrome is WAY faster. Chrome saves me hours a week at work where I have to use apps which run 5-10X faster on Chrome compared to IE.

rct0725 · 09 May 2010

I'm writing this on Opera, but I have IE8, FF and Chrome also installed. It "seems" Opera runs the fastest, and that includes the new Chrome build with Flash.

Still, IE8 64-bit runs pretty fast on my 64-bit Win7, BUT I don't use it very much because of the absolutely maddening lack of Flash support. Adobe lost me with its reader and I cannot wait to ditch it completely because of Flash. But then again that's a rant for another topic...

Firestrider · 09 May 2010

With sites heavy in graphics (SVG, canvas) and client-based scripts Chrome is a lot faster than IE8. I can see a huge difference on my school's site which uses a bunch of JavaScript, for example.

Speed of a page load also depends on your network connection. If downloading HTML, CSS, JS, and content (images, fonts, etc) files to your machine is the dominant factor in the overall time to display a webpage, then the speed of the browser is less significant. I remember when I had a 1 mbps internet connection I could not see the difference in speed between IE8 and Chrome. Now that I have a 30 mbps connection I can definitely see the speed advantage of Chrome

With sites that use server-based technology like PHP, ASP.Net, CFM, JSP, etc (which a lot of sites seem to be doing now) there won't be much of a difference in speed.

Try playing non-Flash browser-based games like freeciv.net and lord of ultima with IE8. It's either going to not render properly or choke.

husky · 09 May 2010

I use internet explorer 8 with simple ie adblock and everything runs perfectly, without any stutter or lag. I have a 25 mbps connection and I don't see what the hype about chrome is. All websites load in less than a second.

On the other hand, Chrome doesn't have a good adblock addon, based on the technical limitations of the program.

I even tried the chrome frame and see absolutely no difference....

On google.com, when I load it with ie 8, the site loads actually faster..I think this is because ie 8 will show you what it is loading while it is loading...Like it will first show you half the page then, finishes loading the entire page....Chrome, on the other hand, won't show you the page until the entire page is loaded...But that's just for chrome.

Also, chrome doesn't have an addon manager. For example, there is no way to disable adobe flash easily. There is no options that allow you to enable or disable them. You do have one for extensions though.
Does anyone know a specific website which can prove that chrome is faster?

Firestrider · 09 May 2010

Compare the difference in web applications like GMail, Google Docs (especially the drawing application), and Google Wave. http://Ares.palm.com and http://bespin.mozillalabs.com are web-based IDEs for development and are good indicators of browser speed. The best demonstration of browser speed are games though... Freeciv.net - online multiplayer strategy game and Home - Lord of Ultima are good examples.

Try out www.chromeexperiments.com too.

Chrome does have a plugin manager. Does type "about: plugins" (without the space) in the URL box and you can disable each plugin individually if you want.

MWRed · 09 May 2010

I've used both, and anytime I hear anything about "this browser is faster than that one" it's always based on controlled tests, not real world use. Sure, Chrome might be fast, but if you're talking in milliseconds....does it really matter? And based on your PC, it can be different for everyone. If you can't notice a difference just by "using" it, then what's the point?

I don't use either anymore, although IE8 always seemed pretty decent considering what it is. Chrome, basically stripped down, clean install, is going to be faster just because of simplicity and nothing getting in the way. I use Opera, I've used almost everything at some point, and the only slowness that I ever find noticeable is cold startup speed. After that, none of it matters.

I don't care about browser tests. They're no different than the PC benchmark tests. Sure, it looks good, but in real use, it really makes no difference.

I've used FF for years before switching to Opera. Now FF is just my backup browser for stubborn sites. But with FF being so bloated, I'm actually tempted to start using IE8 instead.

noel55 · 09 May 2010

i agree with the above totally

Product FRED · 09 May 2010

In terms of speed right now, in order:

Opera
Chrome
Firefox
Internet Explorer 8

If you're comparing Internet Explorer 8 vs Chrome, the clear choice is Chrome. Its addons are more plentiful and varied, easier to create, and page loading and rendering is much faster. Firefox vs Chrome is more about UI preference, although Chrome uses a lot less memory than Firefox over long browsing sessions. Chrome's tabs, plugins, and extensions are also run as separate processes, so if something crashes, it's isolated and doesn't bring down the whole browser. I've been using Chrome for over a year now, and I used to be a longtime Firefox fan.