Google Chrome based on Chromium
Google Chrome is a cross-platform web browser developed by Google. It was first released in 2008 for Microsoft Windows, built with free software components from Apple WebKit and Mozilla Firefox. Versions were later released for Linux, macOS, iOS, and also for Android, where it is the default browser. The browser is also the main component of ChromeOS, where it serves as the platform for web applications.
Most of Chrome's source code comes from Google's free and open-source software project Chromium, but Chrome is licensed as proprietary freeware. WebKit was the original rendering engine, but Google eventually forked it to create the Blink engine; all Chrome variants except iOS used Blink as of 2017.As of October 2022, StatCounter estimates that Chrome has a 67% worldwide browser market share (after peaking at 72.38% in November 2018) on personal computers (PC), is most used on tablets (having surpassed Safari), and is also dominant on smartphones and at 65% across all platforms combined. Because of this success, Google has expanded the "Chrome" brand name to other products: ChromeOS, Chromecast, Chromebook, Chromebit, Chromebox, and Chromebase.Development
Chrome was assembled from 25 different code libraries from Google and third parties such as Mozilla's Netscape Portable Runtime, Network Security Services, NPAPI (dropped as of version 45), Skia Graphics Engine, SQLite, and a number of other open-source projects. The V8 JavaScript virtual machine was considered a sufficiently important project to be split off (as was Adobe/Mozilla's Tamarin) and handled by a separate team in Denmark coordinated by Lars Bak. According to Google, existing implementations were designed "for small programs, where the performance and interactivity of the system weren't that important", but web applications such as Gmail "are using the web browser to the fullest when it comes to DOM manipulations and JavaScript", and therefore would significantly benefit from a JavaScript engine that could work faster.
Chrome initially used the WebKit rendering engine to display web pages. In 2013, they forked the WebCore component to create their own layout engine Blink. Based on WebKit, Blink only uses WebKit's "WebCore" components, while substituting other components, such as its own multi-process architecture, in place of WebKit's native implementation. Chrome is internally tested with unit testing, automated testing of scripted user actions, fuzz testing, as well as WebKit's layout tests (99% of which Chrome is claimed to have passed), and against commonly accessed websites inside the Google index within 20–30 minutes. Google created Gears for Chrome, which added features for web developers typically relating to the building of web applications, including offline support. Google phased out Gears as the same functionality became available in the HTML5 standards.In March 2011, Google introduced a new simplified logo to replace the previous 3D logo that had been used since the project's inception. Google designer Steve Rura explained the company reasoning for the change: "Since Chrome is all about making your web experience as easy and clutter-free as possible, we refreshed the Chrome icon to better represent these sentiments. A simpler icon embodies the Chrome spirit – to make the web quicker, lighter, and easier for all."On January 11, 2011, the Chrome product manager, Mike Jazayeri, announced that Chrome would remove H.264 video codec support for its HTML5 player, citing the desire to bring Google Chrome more in line with the currently available open codecs available in the Chromium project, which Chrome is based on. Despite this, on November 6, 2012, Google released a version of Chrome on Windows which added hardware-accelerated H.264 video decoding. In October 2013, Cisco announced that it was open-sourcing its H.264 codecs and would cover all fees required.On February 7, 2012, Google launched Google Chrome Beta for Android 4.0 devices. On many new devices with Android 4.1 and later preinstalled, Chrome is the default browser. In May 2017, Google announced a version of Chrome for augmented reality and virtual reality devices.
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