The Role of the CPU in Energy-Efficient Mobile Web Browsing

Mobile Web browsing advancements have largely been driven by the single-minded pursuit of performance. This article takes a different stance and examines the energy efficiency of mobile Web browsing. Focusing on both the network and CPU, the authors find that generational advancements in network technology have reached a point where the mobile CPU is starting to have noticeable impact on Web browsing performance and energy consumption. Achieving energy-efficient mobile Web browsing requires considering both CPU and network capabilities (that is, latency). The authors show that under different network latency conditions, achieving energy-efficient mobile Web browsing mandates different CPU performance capabilities. It is important to understand and leverage such interactions between the network and CPU to deliver high mobile Web performance while maintaining a low energy footprint, which current OS dynamic voltage and frequency scaling governors fail to achieve. The authors´ findings suggest that designing future high-performance and energy-efficient mobile Web clients implies looking beyond individual components and taking a full system perspective.