Google Chrome 6: What it is and how to get it

Google Chrome turns 2 today – and Google is celebrating with the release of Chrome 6.

Two years after Google released the first edition of its Chrome browser, the search giant has launched Chrome 6, a platform that company reps says is three times faster at chewing through JavaScript than the original iteration. In addition, Chrome 6 gets an even more streamlined interface, a host of bug fixes, and an adjusted color scheme which is reportedly "easier on the eyes."

You can download Chrome 6 here.

"Watching the 1985 classic Back to the Future last night, I was struck by how much things can change with time," Google's Brian Rakowski wrote in a Chrome birthday post. "The main character Marty McFly travels 30 years back in time, only to find that his house hadn’t been built yet, skateboards hadn’t been invented and nobody had ever heard rock ‘n roll."

Ditto for Chrome, Rakowski joked: "Looking back today on Chrome’s second anniversary, it’s amazing to see how much has changed in just a short time."

Of course there are other ways to measure the success of a browser than constant innovation. For instance, you know you've made a dent when other companies are building off functionalities that you introduced. Late last month, a Microsoft website in Russian posted a screenshot from the forthcoming Internet Explorer 9 – and IE9 sure looked an awful lot like Chrome, from the tidy layout to the sleek design.

As Horizons blogger Chris Gaylord noted at the time, if you had to emulate a current browser, Chrome is a good way to go. Google has attracted more users to Chrome than any other browser on the market this year – and it currently claims five percent of all users, even more than Safari, which comes preinstalled on Apple machines.