Internet Browsers Battle to See Which Consumes Least Amount of Power

Power consumption is not one of those things you really think about when you bring up your Internet browser. Sure, you look at stats like memory usage and (in my case) screen real estate, but power usage doesn’t really come up. That may explain why Microsoft recently posted a blog that goes into great detail about how one of the objectives of Internet Explorer 9 was to make it work fast while consuming the least amount of power.

Their results, not surprisingly, is that Internet Explorer 9 was the most energy efficient browser with an average battery life of 3:45. The only other browser close to IE9? Firefox 4, which had an overall time of 3:35.

For many customers, battery life is the most important gauge of power consumption. A typical laptop uses a 56 Watt hour battery, which means the laptop can consume 56 Watts worth of energy for one hour before running out. The fewer Watts the browser consumes the longer the laptop battery will last. Where�s how the battery life works out across these scenarios for a standard 56 Watt laptop.

Maybe I’m weird, but browser use never equated to me for power consumption. I’ve no real idea why, but it just didn’t. Still, while I very much enjoy IE9, I don’t see the power efficiency issue switching me from Chrome. How ’bout you?

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