7 ms·

It's awesome to see Chrome trying to improve performance for people with many tabs open, which is many of us. I use a LOT of tabs, and the best plugin has been

It's awesome to see Chrome trying to improve performance for people with many tabs open, which is many of us. I use a LOT of tabs, and the best plugin has been The Great Suspender. Highly recommend it for anyone who wants memory & CPU back and keeps many tabs/windows open at once: https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/the-great-suspender/klbibkeccnjlkjkiokjodocebajanakg https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/the-great-suspende...

Analog24 10y ago
Seconded. Chrome used to crash ~1/month on me but ever since I started using The Great Suspender I haven't had a single incident and it's been well over a year.
creeble 10y ago
Fantastic tip, thx!
mark242 10y ago
+1 recommendation for The Great Suspender. Works like a charm, noticeable difference on overall system performance.
ausjke 10y ago
same here using The great suspender, how does this throttle thing relate to the suspender?
- mcescalante 10y ago
  If you are using The Great Suspender, chances are that background tabs are going to be fully suspended so the aggressive throttling isn't even needed. tl;dr - Great suspender is even "more aggressive" than the outlined throttling, as it fully suspends the page and returns all CPU and RAM to you, so it's a great solution for people interested in throttling background tabs.
  - RandyRanderson 10y ago
    I use the GS and love it however I'm not sure it returns even most of the ram. Maybe 50pc. Certainly Javascript CPU usage is reduced however chrome seems to slow down based on how many tabs you have open regardless of what they have in them.
- samfisher83 10y ago
  Yeah I just use this. I works very well. Its annoying how much JavaScript pages are running now days.
blauditore 10y ago
I meet many tab hoarders (always open a new one, never close any, ending up with hundrets), but just can't wrap my head around it! I hate having more than 6-7 simultaneously open because it gets increasingly harder to keep an overview of what you're doing. The same applies for IDE tabs or windows. Too much of them and finding the right one becomes increasingly hard, and losing the thread more likely.
- baby 10y ago
  Not if you use Tree Style Tabs. I've been using it for years and I have no idea how other people can efficiently browse the web without it.
  - kakarot 10y ago
    Tree Style Tabs is a nice idea, but I found the balance of aesthetic and speed for me to be with pressing Ctrl+L and then inputting a few letters relating to the open tab I seek, then just pressing Enter and switching to the tab.
    - mcintyre1994 10y ago
      I don't understand why this seems to only be a thing in Firefox - it's awesome.
      - fiddlerwoaroof 10y ago
        I remember looking for a similar Chrome extension, but I think Chrome doesn't provide the appropriate hooks, or something.
        callalex 10y ago
        Interestingly, Mozilla is trying to move in the same direction by supporting the same extension APIs as Chrome because they are more maintainable/secure/universal/performant but continue to struggle with adoption because things like the Tree Style Tabs extension are not possible with that api https://blog.mozilla.org/addons/2015/08/21/the-future-of-developing-firefox-add-ons/ https://blog.mozilla.org/addons/2015/08/21/the-future-of-dev...
DamnInteresting 10y ago
The combo of The Great Suspender + Session Buddy makes tab management so much better, and easier on resources. Leave open the tabs you know you'll need soon(ish) and let the Great Suspender throttle them, and save (then close) groups of tabs/windows you won't need right away using Session Buddy. https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/session-buddy/edacconmaakjimmfgnblocblbcdcpbko?hl=en https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/session-buddy/edac...
bsg75 10y ago
Any experience on how it compared to The Great Discarder from the same dev? https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/the-great-discarder/jlipbpadkjcklpeiajndiijbeieicbdh https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/the-great-discarde...
- Ajedi32 10y ago
  The description for that extension in the store explains it pretty well: """ Advantages over The Great Suspender: - More memory savings - Compatible with chrome tab syncing - Super lightweight extension that uses no content scripts or persistent background scripts Disadvantages over The Great Suspender: - No visibility on which tabs have been suspended - Unable to prevent a tab from reloading when it gains focus """
redthrowaway 10y ago
Unfortunately, I find a lot of sites don't play nice with The Great Suspender. Lots of js-heavy sites would break when they were "resumed", resulting in my place in an article/podcast/video/etc being lost. I'm glad Google is addressing the issue; hopefully they'll do so in a way that's more transparent to the user.
- kilroy123 10y ago
  Just white-list those sites.
humblebee 10y ago
Is there anything that does the opposite of this? A lot of our current tests run in a browser window, and generally I leave it in the background as I don't want to stare at my tests running. However, when they are backgrounded they slow down and sometimes fail due to timeouts. I haven't actually tried, but does opening a new window get around this even if it does not have focus?

Analog24 10y ago

Seconded. Chrome used to crash ~1/month on me but ever since I started using The Great Suspender I haven't had a single incident and it's been well over a year.

creeble 10y ago

Fantastic tip, thx!

mark242 10y ago

+1 recommendation for The Great Suspender. Works like a charm, noticeable difference on overall system performance.

ausjke 10y ago

same here using The great suspender, how does this throttle thing relate to the suspender?

mcescalante 10y ago
If you are using The Great Suspender, chances are that background tabs are going to be fully suspended so the aggressive throttling isn't even needed. tl;dr - Great suspender is even "more aggressive" than the outlined throttling, as it fully suspends the page and returns all CPU and RAM to you, so it's a great solution for people interested in throttling background tabs.
- RandyRanderson 10y ago
  I use the GS and love it however I'm not sure it returns even most of the ram. Maybe 50pc. Certainly Javascript CPU usage is reduced however chrome seems to slow down based on how many tabs you have open regardless of what they have in them.
samfisher83 10y ago
Yeah I just use this. I works very well. Its annoying how much JavaScript pages are running now days.

blauditore 10y ago

I meet many tab hoarders (always open a new one, never close any, ending up with hundrets), but just can't wrap my head around it! I hate having more than 6-7 simultaneously open because it gets increasingly harder to keep an overview of what you're doing. The same applies for IDE tabs or windows. Too much of them and finding the right one becomes increasingly hard, and losing the thread more likely.

baby 10y ago
Not if you use Tree Style Tabs. I've been using it for years and I have no idea how other people can efficiently browse the web without it.
- kakarot 10y ago
  Tree Style Tabs is a nice idea, but I found the balance of aesthetic and speed for me to be with pressing Ctrl+L and then inputting a few letters relating to the open tab I seek, then just pressing Enter and switching to the tab.
  - mcintyre1994 10y ago
    I don't understand why this seems to only be a thing in Firefox - it's awesome.
    - fiddlerwoaroof 10y ago
      I remember looking for a similar Chrome extension, but I think Chrome doesn't provide the appropriate hooks, or something.
      - callalex 10y ago
        Interestingly, Mozilla is trying to move in the same direction by supporting the same extension APIs as Chrome because they are more maintainable/secure/universal/performant but continue to struggle with adoption because things like the Tree Style Tabs extension are not possible with that api https://blog.mozilla.org/addons/2015/08/21/the-future-of-developing-firefox-add-ons/ https://blog.mozilla.org/addons/2015/08/21/the-future-of-dev...

DamnInteresting 10y ago

The combo of The Great Suspender + Session Buddy makes tab management so much better, and easier on resources. Leave open the tabs you know you'll need soon(ish) and let the Great Suspender throttle them, and save (then close) groups of tabs/windows you won't need right away using Session Buddy. https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/session-buddy/edacconmaakjimmfgnblocblbcdcpbko?hl=en https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/session-buddy/edac...

bsg75 10y ago

Any experience on how it compared to The Great Discarder from the same dev? https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/the-great-discarder/jlipbpadkjcklpeiajndiijbeieicbdh https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/the-great-discarde...

Ajedi32 10y ago
The description for that extension in the store explains it pretty well: """ Advantages over The Great Suspender: - More memory savings - Compatible with chrome tab syncing - Super lightweight extension that uses no content scripts or persistent background scripts Disadvantages over The Great Suspender: - No visibility on which tabs have been suspended - Unable to prevent a tab from reloading when it gains focus """

redthrowaway 10y ago

Unfortunately, I find a lot of sites don't play nice with The Great Suspender. Lots of js-heavy sites would break when they were "resumed", resulting in my place in an article/podcast/video/etc being lost. I'm glad Google is addressing the issue; hopefully they'll do so in a way that's more transparent to the user.

kilroy123 10y ago
Just white-list those sites.

humblebee 10y ago

Is there anything that does the opposite of this? A lot of our current tests run in a browser window, and generally I leave it in the background as I don't want to stare at my tests running. However, when they are backgrounded they slow down and sometimes fail due to timeouts. I haven't actually tried, but does opening a new window get around this even if it does not have focus?