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Google Chrome will start blocking heavy ads in August.
Stephen Shankland / CNET
To improve battery life, network usage and website speed, Chrome will remove ads that consume too much computing resources, Google said Thursday. Google will start experimenting with the technology in the coming months and plans to incorporate it into Chrome in August, Google said in a blog post on Thursday.
The move will only eliminate the worst ad criminals, including those trying to mine cryptocurrencies, using images with unnecessarily large file sizes, demanding more than 4 megabytes of network data, or occupying the main browser computing process for more than 60 seconds, Google said. Violators will be replaced by a notice that says “ad removed.”
Google’s new advertising intervention reflects a growing effort by browser manufacturers to override website instructions and try to fix problems that may degrade the web. Brave blocks ads by default, Vivaldi now offers ad blocking as an option, and Apple Safari, Microsoft Edge, and Mozilla take several steps to prevent ads from tracking you online and infringing on privacy.
Advertisers may not be happy with the changes, but many of us are taking even more aggressive action than browsers do by default. Ad blockers are becoming more common, now on mobile devices and personal computers. Other extensions also block ad tracking.
The action will focus on the ads that Google discovered are the worst criminals to exceed Google’s limits. “While today only 0.3% of ads exceed this threshold, they represent 27% of the network data used by ads and 28% of all CPU usage for ads,” said Marshall Vale, program manager. Chrome, in a blog post.
Google, which relies on online ads for most of its revenue, said in 2016 that Chrome wouldn’t block ads. But he changed his mind and in 2018 began blocking ads on websites that used too many in Google’s judgment and an allied effort by the industry, the Coalition for Better Ads.
Microsoft’s new Edge browser, based on the same Google Chromium project that Chrome uses, has also been moved to block intrusive ads.
