The latest beta enables you to access your open tabs from other devices

Apr 10, 2012 16:21 GMT  ·  By

Google Chrome 19 has, finally, made it to the beta channel. Google Chrome 19.0.1084.15 is the first beta channel release and will eventually become the stable release.

There's not much to brag about in this latest update, the only feature Google thought worth writing about is the open tab sync feature, which enables you to continue where you left off on your mobile device or your work computer.

"Imagine you’ve looked up directions to a cool new restaurant on your home computer. Later, when you’re leaving work, you realize you can’t quite remember how to get there," Google wrote.

"If only you could quickly pull up the same directions on your office computer with one click!," it added.

"Well, with the latest Chrome Beta, you can. When you’re signed in to Chrome, the tabs you have open on one device are available on all your other devices—just click the 'Other devices' menu on the New Tab page," Google explained.

The feature's been around for a while now, in the dev channel, so anyone keeping up with Chrome development shouldn't be surprised. It's an interesting feature, but one that suffers from a key flaw.

The big problem with it is that the other browser or "device" has to be open when you try to access the tabs for the feature to work. What this means is that, it's not really meant for you to go from one device to another, since you'll have to be running both devices for it to work.

If you close the browser, you lose the tabs and they're not accessible anywhere else. The caveat is that if you don't close the browser and only close the lid on your laptop, for example, the tabs will be there.

Users will find it arbitrary and limiting, so while the feature would be great, what Google delivered won't get much use.