In September 2020, support for this tool appeared in Chrome 85, but then it was available to a limited number of users. Automatic blocking of resource-intensive ads became widespread only in Chrome 87. Now the browser can automatically block ad units that consume a lot of computer resources.

The blocking function disables iframes with advertising content if the main thread consumed more than 60 seconds of CPU time in total, or 15 seconds in a 30-second interval (more than 50% resource consumption is more than 30 seconds). In addition, the advertising content will be blocked if the block downloads more than 4 MB of data over the network. Automatic blocking is triggered if the user did not interact with the advertisement until the mentioned limits were exceeded, for example, did not click on it.

From reviews on the Internet, as well as their own tests, BleepingComputer journalists using the example of The New York Times were able to find out that the option is available in versions of Chrome 87 for PCs, as well as mobile devices on Android. When an ad is removed, a message appears in its place: “This ad was using too much of your device’s resources, so Chrome removed it.”

It is noteworthy that even ads launched through the Google Adsense advertising network are removed. The very first mention of this option appeared back in May 2020. Thus, the company is working to improve the performance of its browser, which has often been criticized and ridiculed for its resource intensity. On February 10, 2020, YouTube blogger Jonathan Morrison posted a video where he stress-tested Google Chrome on a Mac Pro. The browser was able to take up 1.4 terabytes of RAM.