TL;DR
- Google has announced that an Arm version of Chrome is now available for Windows on Arm laptops.
- This comes almost four years after Google released a native version of Chrome for Macs with Apple Silicon.
- It also comes roughly seven years after the first full-fledged Windows on Arm laptops debuted on the market.
Google Chrome is one of several big-name apps that don’t have a native, Arm version for Windows on Arm laptops. Thankfully, Google and Qualcomm have now confirmed the availability of an Arm version of Chrome for the platform.
The Canary version of the native Chrome app has been available for Windows on Arm since late January, but Qualcomm and Google announced that people can now download a stable version of this app too.
A long wait for owners of Snapdragon laptops
The news comes roughly seven years after the first Windows on Arm laptops hit the market, and it’s been almost that long since we first heard about an Arm version of Chrome. It also comes almost four years after Google released an Arm version of Chrome for Arm-powered Macs.
This long-running absence meant that owners of Windows on Arm laptops had to use Arm versions of Microsoft Edge or Firefox if they wanted a speedy, efficient web browser. Users could still run the x86 version of Chrome on their Arm laptop, but this incurred a significant performance penalty.
In other words, this is a long overdue release for Google. The release also comes as laptop makers ready the first computers to be powered by Qualcomm’s ambitious Snapdragon X Elite chipset. These laptops are due to debut in mid-2024.
