US Patent 9544388 Client-side predictive caching for content

Disclosed are various embodiments for client-side predictive caching of content to facilitate instantaneous use of the content. If a user is likely to commence use of a content item through a client, the client is configured to predictively cache the content item before the user commences use. In doing so, the client may obtain metadata for the content item and an initial portion of the content item from another computing device. The client may then initialize various resources to facilitate instantaneous use of the content item by the client based at least in part on the metadata and the initial portion. The client-side cache may be divided into multiple segments with different content selection criteria.