Often when we use our mobile phones, it's for something fast in the moment. We see a food item we can’t identify, or hear a song lyric, and want to know more—quick answers to quick questions.

So we’re bringing a new feature to Chrome—search from any webpage with just a tap. Since Chrome can see the page you’re searching from, it can give you more accurate search results. For example, just tapping on “America” on the page below shows a search about the movie “Captain America: Civil War”, not the country. Just slide up to see more information—news, cast, images and more.
This is coming to Chrome on Android over the next few days (with Asian language support to follow).

Posted by Donn Denman, Software Engineer and Top Tapper

Adobe Flash allows web pages to display rich content—but sometimes that can put a squeeze on your laptop’s battery. So we’ve been working with Adobe to ensure that your experience on the web can be power-efficient as well as rich and interactive—and today, we’re introducing an update to Chrome that does just that.

When you’re on a webpage that runs Flash, we’ll intelligently pause content (like Flash animations) that aren’t central to the webpage, while keeping central content (like a video) playing without interruption. If we accidentally pause something you were interested in, you can just click it to resume playback. This update significantly reduces power consumption, allowing you to surf the web longer before having to hunt for a power outlet.

This feature will be enabled by default on Chrome’s latest desktop Beta channel release starting today, and will be rolling out soon to everyone else on Chrome desktop. If you need to manually enable it, just head to Chrome’s content settings and select “Detect and run important plugin content.”

We'll be rolling out more power improvements in the coming months - stay tuned!

Posted by Tommy Li, Software Engineer and Power Conservationist