Chrome, at least, is typically built in the cloud (I don't know about Android, though it would be weird for it to be the only major project that doesn't do this

Chrome, at least, is typically built in the cloud (I don't know about Android, though it would be weird for it to be the only major project that doesn't do this). It's not just that you can have beefier machines in the cloud (though that's a factor); it's also that you can have a shared cache of build artifacts for all your users, which makes most workflows a lot faster. See documentation: https://chromium.googlesource.com/infra/goma/client/ https://chromium.googlesource.com/infra/goma/client/