So, last week Google launched its new web-browser Chrome (I would have written about it before, but was nowhere near my blog for most of the week – sorry!).  I’ve downloaded it and played with a bit and it’s…err….OK.  I think, given the hype in the media and the blogs of the past week that it might have been more special than it is.  It’s fast, I’ll give you that.  But, I dont think Firefox need worry!

Right now, the browser market splits pretty much in three: Microsoft’s Internet Explorer which has 75% of the market (largely due to the fact that it comes pre-installed on any PC running Windows); Mozilla Firefox (God’s own broswer) has around 20% of the market and the other 5% is made up of the lesser known browsers like Opera, Maxthon, Safari (Macs) etc.

The install was quite easy and it pulled in all my bookmarks, passwords and search history easily from Firefox.  The tabs are simple and clean and there’s the obvious integration with Google search.  But, in terms of add-ons, Google are gonna have to play catch-up fast.  There are so many things in Firefox that I have come to rely on that it’s going to take more than a brand like Google to pull me away from.

Here’s what it looks like.  Like Google Search, it’s clean, simple and well executed.  One standard feature I quite like is the ‘Most Visited’ panels when you open a new tab.  It’s a bit like Firefox’s ‘Fast Dial’ add-on but not as good…

So, what can I say?  It’s OK, but I’m a digital marketing consultant not a techie.  For me, as long as it does what it should in handling properly the myriad of web technologies that sites out there are built in, then I guess it will do OK with Google’s backing.  If it doesn’t, then Google will either need to fix it or forget it.

You can download Google Chrome here: http://www.google.com/chrome