Google Chrome to reduce memory usage significantly using Windows 10 version 2004 feature

Modern browsers, including Microsoft Edge and Google Chrome, use more RAM because of its multi-process and sandbox architecture. However, in Windows 10 May 2020 update, Microsoft has introduced segment heap memory improvements to reduce the memory usage of Win32 applications.

Microsoft’s chromium-based browser, Microsoft Edge, is already taking advantage of the segment heap memory improvements, with an early test showing up to 27 percent reduction in memory usage on the Windows 10 May 2020 update.

Kim Denny, Principal PM Manager, Microsoft Edge, said in a blog post, “With the Windows 10 May 2020 Update, Microsoft Edge has leveraged the Windows segment heap memory improvements now available for Win32 applications to manage memory more efficiently. Early internal testing results of devices on the May 2020 Update are showing a memory usage reduction of up to 27% when browsing with Microsoft Edge.”

He added, “Details are in the bug but it appears that the default Windows heap is tuned for server workloads where throughput is what matters most, and Chromium (especially due to its multi-process architecture) also has to care about memory footprint. Experiments with per-machine opting-in to the segment heap for chrome.exe suggests that this could save hundreds of MB in the browser and Network Service utility processes, among others, on some machines.”

As per the recently added commit on the Chromium Gerrit, Google Chrome will also take advantage of the segment heap memory. In the commit, Chrome developer, Bruce Dawson, said, “Adding a SegmentHeap entry to the chrome.exe manifest will tell recent-enough versions of Windows (20-04 and beyond) to opt chrome.exe into using the segment heap instead of the legacy heap.”

Microsoft and Google both note that the actual results will vary depending upon the configuration and usage. However, lower memory usage is expected to provide users a better experience.