Edge Chromium dropping frames on YouTube videos

[Fumega]

Hello (system specs are on the end of the post).

I've both Edge Chromium dev (Version 83.0.478.10 (Official build) dev (64-bit)) and Edge Chromium (Version 81.0.416.58 (Official build) (64-bit)) installed, the browsers are fast overall but the problem is, every time I watch a video on YouTube, there are lots of dropped frames. The thing is, with Firefox I've almost no dropped frames, and with Edge, I've like 300 times as many dropped frames.
For example, in this 8K YouTube video I've one dropped frame in Firefox (and it's in the beginning, so it's irrelevant): 

While I've 393 dropped frames in Edge Chromium (both versions):

I've hardware acceleration turned on, if I turn it off, the videos become unwatchable (lots of dropped frames, as CPU can't keep up).

Do you know if there is something that can be done in order to fix it, or is Edge Chromium just slower?

Best regards.

System specs

Operating System
Windows 10 Pro 64-bit 1909 build 18363.778
CPU
AMD Ryzen 7 1800X 53 °C
Summit Ridge 14nm Technology
RAM
32,0GB Dual-Channel Unknown @ 1199MHz (17-17-17-39)
Motherboard
ASRock X370 Taichi (AM4) 31 °C
Graphics
LG HDR 4K (3840x2160@60Hz)
ROG PG279Q (2560x1440@144Hz)
3071MB NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080 Ti (MSI) driver version 445.75
Storage
7452GB Seagate ST8000VN0022-2EL112 (SATA ) 35 °C
238GB OCZ-VERTEX4 (SATA (SSD))
3726GB Western Digital WDC WD40EFRX-68WT0N0 (SATA ) 33 °C
931GB Samsung SSD 850 EVO 1TB (SATA (SSD)) 33 °C
931GB SAMSUNG HD103SJ USB Device (USB (SATA) ) 35 °C
2328GB Western Digital WDC WD25 EZRX-00MMMB0 USB Device (USB (SATA) ) 35 °C
Optical Drives
ASUS BW-16D1HT
Audio
High Definition Audio Device

[#2]

@Fumega Thanks for reaching out and letting us know. We take performance issues seriously and would love to look into this more deeply. Two questions for you:

1. Based on the specs you included, do you have Firefox installed on one of your SSDs while MS Edge is on a SATA drive?
2. Our media team would love to securely collect some more diagnostics on this with our secure in-browser feedback tool. To make sure that would get routed to them ASAP, we can give you a code to include in the description text. Would you be comfortable doing that? If so, please send me a private message, and I'll generate the code for you.

Fawkes (they/them)
Project & Community Manager - Microsoft Edge

[#3]

@Deleted 

Hello fawkes.

All the browsers are installed on the Samsung SSD 850 EVO 1TB.

Regarding the tool, I'll send you a private message.

Best regards.

[#4]

@Fumega I shared this thread with the team, and after looking into this, they're found our current performance to be comparable with other browsers, but also note that performance may be affected by hardware. However, I am happy to confirm that they're actively looking into improving the mechanics behind this.

Fawkes (they/them)
Project & Community Manager - Microsoft Edge

[#5]

Hello,
Were you able to resolve this? I am having the same issue. Chromium Edge drops a lot of frames, Chrome drop very little while Firefox drops no frame.

[#6]

@Zaheer_id Thanks for following-up on this, and welcome to the MSFT Edge Insider's community! While I am not aware of any further developments, it looks like the team will be working on it soon.

Fawkes (they/them)
Program Manager & Community Manager - Microsoft Edge

[#7]

@Deleted - hi exactly the same issue here - edge version 81 (which uses the old renderer) no dropped frames on 4k hdr using an intel i9 with nvidia 2060  (asus zenbook pro duo) -  version 85, 20 dropped frames a second using exactly the same youtube settings (3840 x 2160, windows scaling off...)

The new renderer doesn't perform anywhere near as well as the old one no  matter what flags i use etc....

Also, any chance of fixing hdr so that it maintains similar brightness levels and saturation/gamma across apps? i have to manually adjust brightness, contrast and saturation with virtually every app and game that has hdr 😞 

[#8]

@Deleted From past few days, Youtube is dropping a ton of frames for me. Chrome drops 50 out of 3000 frames and brave 20-30 out of 3000 for 4k 60fps videos. Meanwhile edge chromium is dropping 500 out of 700 frames for even 720p 60 video. Using edge chromium from a year or more and never faced such issues. It's totally unwatchable and unbearable Please fix it.

[#9]

@Deleted I have just noticed that both Chrome and Edge are having major issues with YouTube videos, in a lot of cases there is around 50% dropped frames on both Applications.

I also use another Chromium Browser called Brave, which does not have this issue. And FireFox also does not have this issue.

In both Edge and Chrome, I can watch a 4K video, and in no time the quality of the video is down to 360p. When you watch a lot of programming videos, they are so blurry you can't read what is going on.

I don't know how anyone who uses Chromium, has not seen how bad this is, but it is right now enough for me to move away from both browsers and never ever return to them.

[#10]

@Doom_Slayer  It is certainly not flawless.  I keep seeing random frames dropping even after one'd think it has started working smoothly. 

[#11]

@Deleted I have done some further testing, on my system here as someone who is in another country to me watched the same video as me and was able to not see any dropped frames and it got me thinking some more.

I did a bit more of a google search and came across this

https://forums.tomshardware.com/threads/poor-youtube-performance-on-chrome-and-edge.3359732/ 

At the very bottom it talks about screen duplication and I feel that it has almost hit the nail on the head, so I did some more tests.

1) I turned my second monitor off, nope still got the issue.
2) Made everything go to my main monitor, nope still did it.

3) Made everything go to my second monitor, and it stopped dropping frames.

Ok, so switched everything back to my main monitor, dropped the resolution from 4K down to 1080p and it stopped dropping frames.

At this point, I am like what the.....

So I then switched my second monitor back to extended and no dropped frames, but the moment I switched back to 4K, I am getting dropped frames again.

Now there is also another thing, Windows 10 for some reason, makes all the text on my 4K monitor really, really small when I am in 4K, yet in 1080p it is not. It is like Windows 10 is not scaling Window Titles correctly with the DPI. I am wondering if this is an issue with these two browsers.

To test this further, I tried this on my Surface 3. At native resolution with DPI scaling at 150%, got dropped frames. Set DPI scaling back to 100%, no dropped frames.

So the question is, did Windows 10 introduce something or did a combination of Windows 10 and Chromium introduce something.

I am still stumped why FireFox and Brave have no issues no matter what though!

[#12]

@CyberAngel From my observations: Brave works the best for me right now. Chrome is close enough too. I have little issues with firefox but it's great. My favorite browser and my default was edge chromium for more than a year and I changed it to brave today. 1 week of a nightmare. I wasn't even able to play 720p videos. Tried re-installing too. Didn't work. 

[#13]

@Doom_Slayer and the other thing, this is only with youtube videos, at least for me.

All Vimeo and Facebook videos play fine at the correct resolution, youtube, on the other hand, will drop resolution till there are no dropped frames and I am sick of trying to watch 360p videos on a 4k monitor.

And not to mention, that I have noticed that the times I have not seen dropped frames, youtube no longer goes to the correct resolution, in other words, it starts at 720p for me and stays there.

But this is something that has only stated happen recently, so hopefully, both Microsoft and Google can work out what they did and get this fixed ASAP.

[#14]

@Fumega 

Hello Guys!

I've got recently new laptop (i5 10210u) and the issue is still present. I'm using 4k60Hz monitor connected via usb-c to displayport cable.  I've tried Edge, Chrome, Firefox and Brave and every of them is droping frames, especially playing 60fps videos (Edge is actually doing good ~ Brave ~ Chrome >> Firefox).

I've noticed that the framerate drop stops when I go fullscreen without any visible Youtube UI (stats for nerds closed too). 

Maybe Windows is messing with something? 

[#15]

@Fumega 

Is there any feedback on this, is MS looking into this at all? I don't see why another browser like Brave, based on Chromium doesn't have this issue, yet Edge does?

And why it only happens to a monitor that is DPI aware either, my other monitor on the same computer doesn't drop frames or drop the viewing resolution down to 360p (normally 480p in most cases).

This is something that has happened in the last few months, and its getting a bit frustrating that you guys have introduced this, a particular version of Chromium doesn't do this and we are having to put up with the consequences of Microsoft breaking stuff and doing nothing to fix it again.

[#16]

@CyberAngel 

Little update. I bought the HEVC codec on Windows market and it still drops frames. So, don't bother spending 1$ 🙂

[#17]

The frame dropping on YouTube started happening to me about 3 dev versions ago. It's gotten so bad, most videos are impossible to watch. It's happening on Canary and the default release. I don't get the problem with Chrome or Brave browser.

[#18]

And it appears to be only videos with 60fps, yet videos with 60fps work on Firefox and Brave for me.

[#19]

@CyberAngel 

I did a little test with opened task manager. I am able to play 4k@60 on 4k@60 monitor without any visible youtube UI. If I change the tab to do something else and leave the video playing, the browser is a little laggy. So, everything looks like in my case the browser is not the problem (same drops on the most of the browsers), but UI animations. Leaving 4k@60 playing fullscreen gives around 10-20 % usage of CPU. But when I start to move my cursor on the video window and back repetitively, the UI is showing and CPU goes crazy 100% usage and the video drops frames. 

So, I maintain my opinion that Windows 10 is responsible for a such inconvenience. 

[#20]

@RobertMulka 

Don't know why you are replying to me. But I concur that it might be Windows 10 doing this, because it affects both Edge and Chrom, but does not affect FireFox and Brave.

As to why it only happens with 60 frames per second video though is a mystery, the video can be recorded at 720p or 1080p, as long as it is 60fps video it has issues. 

And the thing is this is something that has only started happening to me for like 3-5 months now, matching people code in tutorials code in 360p is not fun on a 4K monitor.