This only works in the new Edge browser that dumps Microsoft’s old rendering engine in favor of Chromium, which forms the basis for Google Chrome. Chrome gets better battery life and the new Edge gets Chrome extensions. Microsoft hosts some Edge-specific extensions, but nowhere near as many of them as Google offers. Microsoft Edge There’s a new Edge in town. The Microsoft developers in charge of Windows’ default web browser got tired of chasing compatibility issues resulting from site developers’ only.
Windows 10 comes with a brand new web browser called Microsoft Edge. It's got a lighter design, it's blazing fast and Cortana is baked right into it.
Google Chrome remains the king of the web browsers, with a 66% market share as of September 2020. Microsoft’s newest Edge browser, which uses the Chromium open-source engine, is in fifth-place at. Microsoft Edge is the Superior Windows 10 Browser. After comprehensively comparing Google Chrome and Microsoft Edge, we can safely say that Microsoft Edge is the best Windows 10 browser of 2021 by a considerable margin. Edge consistently beats Chrome in terms of performance, privacy & security handling and system memory usage. Microsoft used to be mocked in the browser game, but recently the company switched its Edge browser over to Chromium.There are a lot of advantages to that, but Google is now warning Microsoft Edge.
Edge washes away everything we hated about Internet Explorer, but how does it compare to Google Chrome, the world's most-used web browser?
See also: Windows 10 review: A needed upgrade with missing pieces
We pitted Edge against Chrome (version 44.0.2403.89m) on an HP Spectre x360 laptop with a 2.2GHz Intel Core i5 processor and 8GB of RAM, and ran a series of benchmark tests to see if Microsoft's new web browser is faster or at least on par with Chrome.
Each web browser was tested as new, meaning Chrome didn't have any extensions to slow it down and the history and cache were reset on each browser after every trial.
Two important things to note: Chrome does come with Adobe Flash pre-installed. We didn't disable it during our benchmark tests as that's the state it would be downloaded in by a normal user.
All tests were performed three times and then the average taken.
Futuremark Peacekeeper
Peacekeeper is a JavaScript benchmark that runs through a number of tests from rendering capabilities, to HTML5, to Document Object Model operations (an API used to create dynamic websites) and text parsing. You can find all of the nerdy details about the tests here.
The higher the Peacekeeper score is, the better overall performance the browser is.
Microsoft Edge | Google Chrome | |
|---|---|---|
Trial 1 | 2563 | 3917 |
Trial 2 | 2551 | 3915 |
Trial 3 | 2461 | 3920 |
Average | 2525 | 3917 |
Chrome Versus Microsoft Edge
As you can see in the benchmark scores above, Chrome smokes Edge in speed and overall performance.
Winner: Google Chrome
SunSpider JavaScript
SunSpider is another JavaScript benchmark, but unlike Peackeeper, it only tests JS and none of the other stuff. Developed by Apple's WebKit team in 2007, it's a commonly used benchmark to compare web browsers as it takes into account features like encryption. You can learn more about the specifics of SS here.
We used the latest 1.0.2 version and here are the results (lower is better):
Microsoft Edge | Google Chrome | |
|---|---|---|
Trial 1 | 105.4ms | 255.8ms |
Trial 2 | 102.3ms | 276.2ms |
Trial 3 | 102.7ms | 270.2ms |
Average | 103.5ms | 267.4ms |
In this test, Edge beats Chrome with an average of 103.5ms, showing it's more equipped to tackle 'real performance problems that developers have encountered' (how SunSpider describes its test).
Winner: Microsoft Edge
V8 Benchmark Suite - Version 7
Which Is Better Chrome Or Microsoft Edge
Google developed its own JavaScript benchmark to test JS performance for Chrome (because Internet, presumably). You can find details on the test here.
Generally it favors Chrome, but let's see how well Edge performs with it. The higher the score, the better.
Microsoft Edge | Google Chrome | |
|---|---|---|
Trial 1 | 21554 | 23376 |
Trial 2 | 22381 | 23791 |
Trial 3 | 21566 | 23657 |
Average | 21834 | 23608 |
Download Chrome To Microsoft Edge
Once again, Google Chrome comes out on top, but not by much.
Winner: Google Chrome
Real-world speed
The benchmarks above provide a good picture of how web browsers compare with one another, but they're far from the only metrics that matter. In my non-synthetic 'real life-tests,' I loaded Mashable.com, NewYorkTimes.com and Facebook.com, and then timed the two. These were the results:
Mashable.com | Microsoft Edge | Google Chrome |
|---|---|---|
Trial 1 | 5.33 seconds | 4.56 seconds |
Trial 2 | 5.75 seconds | 5.10 seconds |
Trial 3 | 5.31 seconds | 4.86 seconds |
Average | 5.46 seconds | 4.84 seconds |
NewYorkTimes.com | Microsoft Edge | Google Chrome |
|---|---|---|
Trial 1 | 5.85 seconds | 5.68 seconds |
Trial 2 | 5.41 seconds | 5.40 seconds |
Trial 3 | 5.69 seconds | 5.53 seconds |
Average | 5.65 seconds | 5.53 seconds |
Facebook.com | Microsoft Edge | Google Chrome |
|---|---|---|
Trial 1 | 3.23 seconds | 3.31 seconds |
Trial 2 | 3.63 seconds | 3.22 seconds |
Trial 3 | 3.38 seconds | 3.29 seconds |
Average | 3.41 seconds | 3.27 seconds |
Google Chrome just barely edges out Microsoft Edge, but you probably won't notice the difference in real life.
Chrome Microsoft Edge Extension
Winner: Google Chrome
Google Chrome is still king, but...
So what did we learn? Well, Google Chrome is faster than Microsoft Edge, but...only if you don't have any extras like extensions installed. When you add those in, Chrome slows down to a crawl.
Chrome And Microsoft Edge
Edge is no slouch, though. It's a very capable browser and after testing it out, I really like it a lot. If Internet Explorer left a bad taste in your mouth, you'll be happy to hear that Edge is a complete reset in the best way possible.
Extensions are coming to Edge and that could — and almost certainly will — slow its performance down, but right now it's nothing but a great start for Windows 10.
Chrome Microsoft Edge
BONUS: Windows 10: The Review