Google Chrome 61 has been released, adding fixes and improvements

The Google Chrome Team has announced a new update of Chrome. The Releases blog mentions the Stable build of Version 61 going into general availability today.

The update to Chrome will roll out in the following "days/weeks" to devices with the browser on supported platforms such as Windows, Mac and Linux.

Since it is a security update, its generally advised to update to the latest version of the browser as soon as possible.

You can force-run an update check by entering chrome://help in the browser address bar. The browser should query the update server and download the update when the page opens.

You may notice a change in the location of the help page. That's because Chrome 61 changes the help location from the previous location to chrome://settings/help. It also looks more like the settings page to ensure uniformity in design.

The Chrome team offers little information on the new release; the only info that is provided is that Chrome 61.0.3163.79 "contains a number of fixes and improvements."

Due to the nature of the update being mainly for security fixes and improvements, there are very little user facing changes. A major portion of the update makes under the hood optimizations and security fixes.

Here are some of the more significant changes in the update:

• Add initial set of new default user images.
• Autoplay policy for HTML5 video: chrome://flags/#autoplay-policy
• Data Saver site breakdown doesn't add up to totals on version update. Also, don't show negative savings.
• DevTools: Add 'Save profile' toolbar button to performance panel.
• Disable first run for managed profiles.
• [Extensions] Don't allow content scripts on the New Tab Page.
• Enable automatically detected CUPS printers in the print preview dialog.
• Enable asm.js -> WebAssembly by default.
• Keep scanned host devices in the cache for longer (from 5 minutes to 2 hours).
• Move extension unzip/unpack to background thread to prevent the blocking of the main utility thread.
• On dual-GPU macs, blacklist MSAA for both GPUs if either is Intel.
• Switch pause/mute buttons' locations in RTL languages

Here is the full list of other changes and fixes between 60.x and 61.0.3163.79 for you to go through.