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Safari : Slowest and Worst

R

rishabhrajan

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Jun 30, 2023
9
0
Hi There Folks,
I'm a big fan of using native apps and I've always stuck with Safari but more recently I've noticed that Safari almost always hangs and gives me this error: This webpage and one other page are not responding. To visit the selected page, the page “YouTube” must be force reloaded. Do you want to visit the selected page?

I will force reload it and sometimes it works while many times I get the same issue. Nothing happens. At first I thought it was my internet connection but then when I switched to Google Chrome, everything was smooth sailing. No issues whatsoever! I've tried restarting, I'm on the latest update for safari but it's still the same.

For details on my computer, I have a new Mac Studio with 64GB RAM running Ventura. I don't have any extensions installed on Safari and am not using a VPN.

Is there any way Safari can run as smoothly as Google Chrome. I like using the passkeys on Safari and I don't think I can use that on Google Chrome.
Any help is greatly appreciated!
 
I also want to add that I really love the auto correct on Safari which is not available on Google Chrome. Or is it? If yes, please do let me know!
 
rishabhrajan said:
I've noticed that Safari almost always hangs and gives me this error:
Click to expand...

rishabhrajan said:
I have a new Mac Studio
Click to expand...

Have same machine and have never had any problems, at least with the Youtube site which I assume is one place where it occurs. Do you have any network touching programs installed such as virus programs, little snitch, etc.? If you have a URL that you can share where this happens that might help.
 
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Thanks for the responses guys!
I need to look into private relay. Not sure if I have that ON.

I don't have any anti-virus or little snitch like programs installed. Regarding urls, its not a specific page, just any webpage with rich multimedia, like YouTube would give me this error.
 
svenmany said:
Have you tried without private relay turned on? If it's on, Safari (and no other browser) routes traffic through Apple servers.
Click to expand...
So I just looked into it. Private relay is only available on iCloud+ and I only have a free version of iCloud. So that shouldn't be the problem.
 
rishabhrajan said:
I don’t even know what that means. What is the user agent string?
Click to expand...
It basically tells the website which browser you're using. I don't know if it's even possible to change it. I was just asking in case someone more knowledgeable could answer.
 
How many extensions are you using? I was dealing with the same issue and excessive tab RAM usage recently. Was using 1Password and Ghostery and would get tabs with 4+GB of usage. Now that I'm using Adguard and have disabled 1Password I'm rarely getting over 1GB and have far fewer slowdowns.

As an aside YouTube has been experimenting with preventing people from watching videos if they have Adblock enabled so after I disabled "content blockers" on YouTube it's runNing significantly better... even though I have YouTube Premium and wouldn’t have seen the ads in the first place...
 
Last edited:
rishabhrajan said:
Regarding urls, its not a specific page,
Click to expand...

It still would be helpful to have a URL. If that URL on a similar system does not show the problem that would eliminate the possibility that there is something unusual with those URLs.
 
boswald said:
It basically tells the website which browser you're using. I don't know if it's even possible to change it. I was just asking in case someone more knowledgeable could answer.
Click to expand...
It is possible. In settings, under "Advanced", you can check "Show develop menu in menu bar". In the menu that is then provided, you can choose the user agent. Chrome is one of the choices available.
 
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It might be a problem with cached data. If you'd like to try to address that, then in settings, under "Privacy/Manage Website Data...", you can clear everything.

I do that now and again, but it has a big downside. All saved state for websites would be lost, like logins. So, for example, a website you visit might require you to relogin and maybe reverify your browser.
 
svenmany said:
It might be a problem with cached data. If you'd like to try to address that, then in settings, under "Privacy/Manage Website Data...", you can clear everything.

I do that now and again, but it has a big downside. All saved state for websites would be lost, like logins. So, for example, a website you visit might require you to relogin and maybe reverify your browser.
Click to expand...
That for this tip. I tried clearing out all cached data and at first it seemed to be fine but quickly I noticed the issue still there. :(
 
Hmm. DNS issue?

Firefox and Chrome are typically configured to use their own DNS servers. Safari uses the system's resolver. What DNS servers are set in System Settings?
 
This is what I have:
Screenshot 2023-07-04 at 12.55.16 PM.png
 
So should I delete the search domain and remove all the DNS IPs to 8.8.8.8 and 8.8.4.4?
 
Alright, will give that a go. I noticed that the operating system doesn't allow me to remove the search domain but I can delete the previous DNS servers.
 
Fingers crossed on the DNS helping. Those are the standard Comcast DNS servers. I use them since I'm a Comcast customer and haven't bothered to change them.

On MacOS, search domains aren't that useful, but they don't hurt anything.
 
Since I'm the one who mentioned DNS as a possible culprit, I want to say that I wasn't referring to any issues with underperforming DNS servers; I was thinking of something more suspicious. Perhaps a local DNS server with a bad cache. Since Comcast's DNS servers are being used, that can be ruled out.

However, the Mac itself has a DNS cache that probably should be cleared, just in case. Try

sudo dscacheutil -flushcache; sudo killall -HUP mDNSResponder
Click to expand...

Someone on another thread reported that this helped them with some slowdowns.
 
Screenshot 2023-07-06 at 7.49.22 PM.png

These settings caused me issues at random with pages on the web. Once I turned them off for Safari I was in good shape. Kind of a bummer given I do like privacy as much as I can get it. Hiding IP was the biggest contributor but cross site tracking blocking can make some sites be less useful or behave oddly too.
 
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I wonder if "Hide IP address from trackers" is just private relay, but restricted to tracking websites. Clicking on "Learn more..." there take me to the System Settings Private Relay setting.
 
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