I'm excited to see this work proceed! We've talked for many years about having a coarse performance tier bucket for devices and personally I think it's long overdue and we should be bold in launching something despite the inevitable debate.
I was just talking with a web developer a couple weeks ago who was lamenting having to provide a lowest-common-denominator user experience because they had no way to reliably progressively enhance their UI on more capable devices. I suggested Device Memory hints as a likely useful proxy, but I don't actually have any good data on the extent to which device memory correlates with device performance (I'm sure it does but also that it's imperfect), do you? I filed a couple issues <https://github.com/explainers-by-googlers/cpu-performance/issues?q=is%3Aissue%20state%3Aopen%20author%3Arbyers> for my questions / thoughts. Thanks, Rick On Wed, Oct 8, 2025 at 9:38 AM 'Nikos Papaspyrou' via blink-dev < [email protected]> wrote: > *Contact emails* > [email protected] > > *Explainer* > https://github.com/explainers-by-googlers/cpu-performance > > *Specification* > None > > *Summary* > Expose some information about how powerful the user device is. This API > targets web applications that will use this information to provide an > improved user experience, possibly in combination with the Compute Pressure > API, which provides information about the user device’s CPU > pressure/utilization and allows applications to react to changes in CPU > pressure. > > *Blink component* > Blink>PerformanceAPIs > <https://issues.chromium.org/issues?q=customfield1222907:%22Blink%3EPerformanceAPIs%22> > > *Web Feature ID* > Missing feature > > *Motivation* > At present, some video conferencing applications support advanced > functionality by relying on internal/private browser extensions or APIs to > classify devices into performance categories. Our proposal allows these > applications to support existing functionality without depending on such > non-standard features. Applications whose functionality depends on > client-side hardware detection often resort to running benchmark workloads, > to estimate hardware capabilities. Providing a public CPU Performance API > would help prevent a needless waste of resources. > > *Initial public proposal* > https://github.com/explainers-by-googlers/cpu-performance > > *TAG review* > None > > *TAG review status* > Pending > > *Risks* > > > *Interoperability and Compatibility* > None > > *Gecko*: No signal > > *WebKit*: No signal > > *Web developers*: No signals > > *Other signals*: > > *WebView application risks* > > Does this intent deprecate or change behavior of existing APIs, such that > it has potentially high risk for Android WebView-based applications? > None > > > *Debuggability* > None > > *Is this feature fully tested by web-platform-tests > <https://chromium.googlesource.com/chromium/src/+/main/docs/testing/web_platform_tests.md>?* > Yes. However, testing this feature will inevitably be limited. Tests > cannot assert that a particular hardware combination will yield a > particular integer value, and are restricted to non-undefined-ness and > non-zero-ness. > > > *Requires code in //chrome?* > True > > *Tracking bug* > https://issues.chromium.org/449760252 > > *Estimated milestones* > > Intent to ship roughly by the end of 2025, in M145. > > > *Link to entry on the Chrome Platform Status* > https://chromestatus.com/feature/5189864286978048?gate=5145253552193536 > > This intent message was generated by Chrome Platform Status > <https://chromestatus.com/>. > > -- > Nikos Papaspyrou <[email protected]> > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "blink-dev" group. > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an > email to [email protected]. > To view this discussion visit > https://groups.google.com/a/chromium.org/d/msgid/blink-dev/CAMHN%3DHydj6Q7pz6i_y3j1ON20a270NFGx%2BKD11Q3VdfTXvtCDg%40mail.gmail.com > <https://groups.google.com/a/chromium.org/d/msgid/blink-dev/CAMHN%3DHydj6Q7pz6i_y3j1ON20a270NFGx%2BKD11Q3VdfTXvtCDg%40mail.gmail.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer> > . > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "blink-dev" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/a/chromium.org/d/msgid/blink-dev/CAFUtAY89h%3D1Dhi7D7XFcof0k2hPu%2B8VBJEb69v8_uvgwhA4xPA%40mail.gmail.com.
