How to Enable / Disable “Background Tabs Throttling” Feature in Google Chrome and Opera Web Browsers

The latest versions of Google Chrome and Opera web browsers i.e. Chrome 57 and Opera 44 come with a new feature called “Background Tab Throttling” or “Background Timer Throttling“. According to the official description of this new feature, it enables intervention to limit CPU usage of background timers to 1%. In other words, this feature has been introduced to improve battery life of your device.

When you open multiple tabs in your web browser, it affects power usage and battery life of your computer or mobile device. The new “Background Tab Throttling” functionality throttles background tabs using excessive power to optimize your device’s battery life.

So basically this new throttling feature has been developed to maximize your device battery life and you should see some or little improvement in your device’s battery life if you are using Chrome 57 or later or Opera 44 or later versions.

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Today in this tutorial, we’ll tell you how to enable or disable this new background tabs throttling feature in Google Chrome and Opera web browsers. If you are facing any issue due to this new feature, you can disable this feature or if the feature is not enabled in your web browser, you can enable it using following steps:

Instructions for Google Chrome Web Browser:

1. Open Google Chrome web browser and type chrome://flags/ in addressbar and press Enter. It’ll open the advanced configuration page.

2. Now press “Ctrl+F” keys together to launch find box and type throttling in the find box.

It’ll directly go to following option:

Throttle expensive background timers Mac, Windows, Linux, Chrome OS, Android
Enables intervention to limit CPU usage of background timers to 1%. #expensive-background-timer-throttling

Disable_Background_Tabs_Throttling_Google_Chrome.png

3. If you want to disable this new feature, select Disabled option from the drop-down box. If you want to enable this feature, select Enabled option from the drop-down box.

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4. Click on “Relaunch Now” button and it’ll restart Google Chrome web browser.

Instructions for Opera Web Browser:

1. Launch Opera web browser and open its hidden secret advanced configuration page using opera://flags command in addressbar.

2. Now click inside “Search experiments” text box and type throttling. It’ll show following options in the result:

Background tab throttling Mac, Windows, Linux
Throttle timers in background tabs. #background-tab-throttling

Throttle expensive background timers Mac, Windows, Linux
Enables intervention to limit CPU usage of background timers to 1%. #expensive-background-timer-throttling

Disable_Background_Tabs_Throttling_Opera.png

3. If you want to disable background tabs throttling feature, select Disabled option from the drop-down box of both options. If you want to enable this feature, select Enabled option from the drop-down box of both options.

4. Opera will show you a message “Your changes will take effect the next time you relaunch Opera” along with a button to relaunch Opera. Click on the “Relaunch Now” button to restart Opera web browser.

That’s it. With the help of the above mentioned steps, you’ll be able to turn on/off background tabs throttling feature in Google Chrome and Opera web browsers.

PS: You can also disable background tabs throttling feature in Google Chrome and Opera web browsers by appending –disable-background-timer-throttling parameter at the end of the string present in Target text box of their shortcut’s properties.

Published in: Google Chrome, Opera

About the author: Vishal Gupta (also known as VG) has been awarded with Microsoft MVP (Most Valuable Professional) award. He holds Masters degree in Computer Applications (MCA). He has written several tech articles for popular newspapers and magazines and has also appeared in tech shows on various TV channels.

Comments

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  1. Doesn’t work in chrome 66, no such option available, ‘throttling’ not found in page after advanced options are enabled.

    This is a total pain because I want to exclude steam from this throttling when managing my steam game item inventory. This throttling causes the Steam inventory to fail.

  2. Hello,My Microsoft phone doesn’t sign in account ,window live id,emails and doesn’t download app please help me

  3. Thank you!
    I find this ver helpful 🙂
    Not to load background tabs at startup or as new opened tabs by links is a must have feature.
    This workaround will perhaps do it a while 🙂

  4. As of 23/01/2020, no such option is in chrome anymore. Throttling is still here tho, as downloading from MEGA goes in the double-digits KB/s if the tab is left.

    It’s probably helping people use the desktop app.

  5. The recent version of Opera does not have the “background tabs throttling” option. Page needs to be updated to reflect this.

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