After years of propping up widespread adoption of the protocol, Google will release Chrome 90 as the first version of the web browser to transmit data to and from sites using HTTPS instead of HTTP by default.

The announcement from the Chromium Blog makes it clear that address entries that don't include the protocol prefix will be amended to include https:// instead of http:// prior to navigation. In short, this will speed up load times in bypassing a redirect from HTTP to HTTPS on the many websites that already support the more secure standard which allows for encrypted two-way communications between your browser and the site.

Chrome will still switch to HTTP if it finds a site that does not support HTTPS, though it will nag you about its riskiness. It will also stick with HTTP for IP addresses, reserved hostnames, and single label domains.

The policy will be in place for the launch of Chrome 90 on desktop and Android and later on for iOS.