Google recently released Chrome for iOS (free) during their developer conference, Google I/O, so iPhone and iPad owners can try out the popular web browser today. Chrome isn’t new to mobile devices as it has been available on select Android devices since February this year.
The big difference for those that have used Chrome for Android isn’t visual. The difference is the fact that it’s actually using the same web rendering and processing that all other iOS apps have access to rather than Google’s own engine (due to Apple’s App Store policies). This isn’t too big of a drawback, because Chrome seems to perform well for typical use and they both share WebKit as the core of their rendering engine anyway (web designers don’t need to worry).
Data syncing across Chrome browsers using the same Google account makes an appearance. There aren’t any extensions or apps to sync, but it does sync bookmarks and allows users to access tabs from browsers they might have opened on their other devices and computers.
Initial impression is that it’s worth checking out even though Chrome for iOS is mostly a wrapper around the same web view as other iOS apps, and people that already use Chrome as their primary browser will see more of a benefit to switching.
Image Gallery
