If you long to able to stream 4K video smoothly on your Android device or desktop PC, Google Chrome hears ya’.
The Chrome Dev Channel on Android and Canary Channel on Windows and Mac OS X, are both hiding experimental support for a new video renderer.
Google’s François Beaufort says the new video renderer is capable of playing 4K video content without stuttering.
Caveats apply here, naturally. You need a super fast processor but you also need a super fast internet connection to play ultra HD video.
If your phone, tablet or laptop screeches to a halt when you play any kind of 4K video on YouTube don’t assume the new rendering algorithm will drastically change things. It may, assuming your processor and graphics are fairly modern, manage a bit better with the feature enabled than without.
Just don’t expect wonders on a Chromebook from 2011 or a low-end tablet running Jellybean.
Enable New 4k Video Renderer in Chrome
To try the new 4K video renderer out on Android you’ll need to install the Chrome Dev app from the Play Store.
Open a new tab and go to:
chrome://flags/#enable-new-video-renderer
Hit the ‘Enable’ option and restart the browser when prompted.
To try the new 4K video renderer in Chrome for desktop you simply need to be running the latest Dev or Canary channel release on Windows, Mac OS X or Linux as it the flag is enabled by default.
When enabled, find a 4K, 4K (60FPS) or 1080p (60FPS) video on YouTube to see if there’s an improvement.