On August 25th, Google updated its web browser Chrome on desktop and mobile to version 85 and then by as early as September 1st, GoogleBot was already crawling and rendering pages using version 85. It is really an evergreen Googlebot.
Valentin Pletzer noticed this in the morning:
Googlebot starts rendering with Chrome v85 #googlebot #chrome85 pic.twitter.com/pfYoMxYOTr
— Valentin Pletzer (@VorticonCmdr) September 4, 2020
But it may have been as early as September 1st according to ScreamingFrog:
Yeah, same here. Looks like around the start of the month. pic.twitter.com/KB8uFAsoL1
— Screaming Frog (@screamingfrog) September 4, 2020
Kelogs saw it as early as August 31st but I guess it depends on your time zone?
Same story here, since August 31 ! pic.twitter.com/m38SZJl5cU
— Kelogs (@_kelogs) September 4, 2020
Serge sees Chrome v87, which is not a stable release yet and Google may be testing it? v87 was a Canary channel release on August 22nd and not a stable release yet.
we see v87, what is it? pic.twitter.com/yDUDgJ4RYO
— Serge Bezborodov (@sergebezborodov) September 4, 2020
Forum discussion at Twitter.
