[jkrems]

But that question doesn't make sense. It contains the assumption that the alternative would be to never ship broken features to users. While the actual alternative would be that they'd ship the same broken feature to all users. Because at some point there's no other testing left.

[khedoros1]

If they're shipping features that need testing, it seems like the Beta version is the right place to ship them, not the stable Chrome or Chromium build. As in: ship the possibly-broken features to people who have already opted into testing, and don't subject your users that chose the "stable" to random testing.

Getting the bad end of someone's unannounced feature testing is the kind of thing that makes me decide to use another browser for a few months, hoping that the problem disappears if/when I go back to it.

[mcbits]

If they're not running new features through their Beta channel, then you have a point. Otherwise, I'd assume the features that make it to field trials have already gone through Beta testing and are thought to be ready to release--which isn't always the case, hence the gradual rollout.

[khedoros1]

I'd say that if they're doing A/B testing or "field trials", then they aren't sure enough to roll the feature out to Stable. That's not Google's policy, though.

They run experiments in Canary, Dev, and Beta, then conduct a roll-out to stable to get a broader test (per the explanation here): https://textslashplain.com/2017/10/18/chrome-field-trials/

I'm just grumpy that we don't live in the perfect world, where confusion-inducing processes like this wouldn't be necessary. I've never been that comfortable with the "break a few eggs" method of progress.