A web app with streaming quotes or charts never refreshes the entire page. You don't seem to know what you are talking about.
I think IB software is written in Java. In my experience, application written Java tends to be slow. Probably, I think due to the fact, it'd take a lot of time and processing power to chase down those built-in methods?
What horrifies me the most, is not alone the sluggish and overall godawful performance of this piece of crap TWS, but obvious faults which could and do impact decisions of personal economic doom. For example in watchlists with numerous instruments, there are data gaps very often. Ok, missing data. Or is it a faulty data stream? Is it this time my isp? Where do I know from that data that is actually shown is correct? When you hear the audio "Data connection lost" my news panel literally showed the same state "Connection lost. Reconnect will be attempted..." since minutes. Obviously faulty... Why is there no self-control indicator to show if a/the data connection is actually working properly? Why is there no button to force the reconnect of the data connection including a log output for further documentation/trouble shooting? This is all so ridiculously weak.
Why don't we have a fast software like Webull or TOS... I don't get it... Such big broker is offering us a trading software from Windows XP times...
Yes, that was the first thing I noticed when installed the application, you could see the Java installer. Obviously rewriting the application in another language like C++ would take a lot of time and development work. For me now, I'm using the web client and that seems fine. I think if they focus on a nice SPA web client going forward that would be great and accessible to all users!
Oddly for me, ToS seems like total garbage compared to TWS. I mean you can't even hotkey effectively in ToS. ToS is pretty but it has such limited functionality its nearly unusable for what I want to do anyway. Also had some crazy lag issues with ToS that cost me quite a bit of money. As far as TWS, it uses Java. You might want to increase the memory allocation. I have mine set to the 2048 (2GB) of memory they suggest and don't experience any lag or slow down. Then again, I have a brand new gaming computer I put together with a top of the line processor and 32 GB of RAM so there is very little to slow down my machine. https://ibkr.info/article/2170 Also, you could have other software on your machine that is slowing you down. Lots of things use Java and depending on what you have loaded on your PC, it could be causing some conflicts. To be honest, using Java probably wasn't the best choice IBKR could have made.
I run TWS and Eikon Terminal at the same time on a Microsoft Surface GO 2 with 8GB of RAM. In addition to these I do run Excel (nothing huge on it), and Outlook. Nothing else. I notice no performance issues worth noting. I do NOT do on-the-tick trading or something that requires extremely fast interaction. For my normal usage, it is perfectly fine. I do have the: -Xmx768m set in the tws.vmoptions file. Is it at all possible that any slowness you are experiencing are network related?
I actually switched from ToS to TWS because of how poorly designed ToS is for day traders. I mean with ToS doesn't even have the ability to hotkey effectively. Honestly, ToS is very, very basic when it comes to day trading despite looking good. On the other hand, ToS is much easier to learn and understand than TWS so I get the appeal. As far as the look of TWS, it is more about function than fancy. Generally speaking, does it really matter how it looks as long as it functions flawlessly? As someone working toward being a professional trader for a living, function is hands down more important in my box. Also of consideration, the most popular trading platforms out on the market, DAS Trader Pro and Sterling Trader both look like they were made in DOS yet these are the platforms of choice for many if not most professional traders. Again Function over Form.
Last year I was with IB and ran TWS on Ubuntu 16.04 on a cheap and crappy Dell Laptop and never had any problems. I liked it well enough, I just like the charts on TradingView better and IB and TradingView cannot see eye to eye on how to implement an interface.