We’ve all heard of the Adobe Flash Player even though most of us probably don’t have a clue as to what it really does. Apparently, it helps play better/high quality videos, animations and games, so most of us usually download the update whenever it comes out. However, it might be the end of the road for the mighty Adobe Flash as Google Chrome plans to integrate HTML5 and other similar technologies into its browser. This means that Adobe Flash will be replaced in order to provide a better user experience.
The new version, Chrome 55, will make its way in December and will support this change. The browser will use HTML5 as default over Flash in websites that support both these technologies. Websites that only support Flash will give you a push notification to enable Flash while you browse the internet using Google Chrome.
Anthony LaForge, Curator of Flash in Chrome, said in a blog post, “Flash helped make the web a rich, dynamic experience, and shaped the modern set of web standards. We continue to work closely with Adobe to ensure that your web experience is as fast and secure as possible and to help the Web transition to HTML5.”
Websites powered by Flash take more time to load as they are usually loaded “behind the scenes to support things like page analytics." To counter this problem, Chrome 53 will block such stuff to improve speed.
Moreover, several publishers have already switched to HTML5 as it increases web loading speed, which is crucial for maintaining traffic. Mr. LaForge further added in the blog: "HTML5 is much lighter and faster, and publishers are switching over to speed up page loading and save you more battery life. You'll see an improvement in responsiveness and efficiency for many sites."
Flash has suffered a setback with the latest development as tech companies now plan to part ways with it. Last month, Mozilla announced that it will automatically block Flash content that it believes is not necessary for its users. It also said that users would need to approve the usage of Flash to view content on any webpage from 2017 onwards.
YouTube de-emphasized Flash plugins from its video streaming platform back in January 2015. The company said that it will provide video content through HTML5 at default on Google Chrome, Internet Explorer, Mozilla Firefox and Safari. HTML5 provides better video quality with average reduction in the bandwidth.
Flash was a popular method to display graphic content to users back in the 1990s. Its decline started after Steve Jobs banned the technology in Apple products. Flash Client, which was developed for Android devices by the company in response to the ban by Apple, was also cancelled later on.