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Which web browser is your go-to?

Which is your favourite web browser?

  • Safari

  • Edge

  • Chrome

  • Opera

  • Brave

  • Firefox

  • Other...

Results are only viewable after voting.
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macrumors 601
Original poster
I've always been a fan of Safari and have kept it as my default since it was first launch.

However, largely due to work requirements, I've started to use Microsoft Edge a lot more and... wow. The speed difference is remarkable. I'm not sure what MS are doing but this thing flies!

I really like the theming options as you can make the window look exactly as you like it. Took a little while to remove all the default Copilot/fluffy features, but you can really get it as simple or as complex as you like.

And of course, if you work in an MS environment, then everything works more smoothly than Safari.

It's mostly my fault for not exploring other options, but I'd be interested to read of others experiences.
 
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On my AS macs I use both Firefox and Safari. On my PowerPC macs I use PowerFox or AquaFox depending on the site. AquaFox is faster, but PowerFox offers more compatibility with the modern web.

On my enemy's computers I used to install Windows 98 and/or ME and IE5 and contact every Nigerian Prince and shady crypto merchant I could find while I torrent files of questionable origin. Since most computers are now too new for that, I just install Arch Linux and purposefully give up half way through the installation and setup.
 
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Vivaldi as primary browser. Vivaldi is from one of the original creators of Opera.

Microsoft Edge for some other things, notably listening/watching YouTube when browsing in Vivaldi.

Safari if I have to do anything on a government website.

But I hate Safari deeply and abhor it on every platform it runs on.
 
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I have been using Vivaldi since 2017, when Failzilla was killing everything that made Firefox great (with Firefox 57). Been trying Safari and Orion on macOS and iOS and I still return to Vivaldi every time. Chrome is not an option, the Vivaldi guys actually care about privacy.
 
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Madonepro said:
Safari everywhere!

Just some basic research shows it’s still the fastest, most reliable of browsers. Haven’t come across a website it won’t load in years, which suggests developers have progressively updated sites.
Click to expand...
I won't argue that- if that is your only criteria for a browser.

I spend a lot of time in a browser every day. My focus is on customization and I'm willing to sacrifice some speed to get it. Safari is pretty poor at allowing customization.

Reliability isn't something I worry about. Vivaldi and Edge load all the sites I use without any difficulty.
 
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Firefox is still the most useful for me on MacOS, although something is making it slower with
Firefox 150 on Tahoe 26.4.1. I rebooted again 10 hours ago and with almost new pages/tabs,
just what I opened with, I'm now seeing memory pressure again, and, it is sluggish to move
between windows and tabs. With very low CPU usage. This problem began with Tahoe.
I'm not sure what the underlying issue is. Overall, with my aggressive privacy/anti-ad configuration,
Firefox is on the slower side.

Still, Firefox seems the best for privacy. I like the fact that you can configure disabling obsolete insecure cipher suites, which you can't do on Safari or most other browsers. Some websites disable access because I'm so aggressive with shutting down "dynamic" ads.

I also use DuckDuckGo, which, conveniently, is in the App Store. I like the fact that it doesn't seem to mind infinite windows and tabs. The other things I like about the DuckDuckGo browser are the built-in JPEG-XL and the built-in DuckPlayer for YouTube. What I don't like is the lack of configuration options to, e.g., turn off old cipher suites. Still, DuckDuckGo is pretty good, and pretty fast, and good with ads.

Safari is OK. Fast, but, not the best wrt ads.

Chrome is at the bottom, obviously. The only thing I like about it is that it is fast.

On iOS variants, iPhone and iPad, I'm kind of stuck with Safari mostly, but, I still use DuckDuckGo a lot because it handles lots of tabs better and seems to have better privacy.
 
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Vivaldi, it's fully customizable, no stupid prompts or annoyances plus it has email client integrated. I think it was also the first browser to implement many features now copied by others (vertical tabs, page screenshots ...)
 
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tutubibi said:
Vivaldi, it's fully customizable, no stupid prompts or annoyances plus it has email client integrated. I think it was also the first browser to implement many features now copied by others (vertical tabs, page screenshots ...)
Click to expand...
I like that I can, just through the browser preferences, put my address bar and tabs at the bottom of the screen. That took a combination of extensions and userscripts with Mozilla based browsers.
 
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I love Safari, I use it on my iPhone and iPad and all of my Apple products, except for not as frequently on my Mac. I mostly use Chrome, mostly only for the Chrome extensions, and because I’m a developer I prefer Google’s Blink rendering engine to WebKit. Most Chrome extensions I use regularly aren’t supported in Safari, so I stick with Chrome. I tried Perplexity Comet, although that’s basically a fork of Chrome with some added AI features that Gemini in Chrome already does. I do use the Tor browser occasionally for testing and privacy also, although not often. I have yet to try Firefox, some people seem to love it, others can’t stand it, I’m not sure if I should switch. 🧭
 
BSDnostalgia said:
Firefox is still the most useful for me on MacOS, although something is making it slower with
Firefox 150 on Tahoe 26.4.1. I rebooted again 10 hours ago and with almost new pages/tabs,
just what I opened with, I'm now seeing memory pressure again, and, it is sluggish to move
between windows and tabs. With very low CPU usage. This problem began with Tahoe.
I'm not sure what the underlying issue is. Overall, with my aggressive privacy/anti-ad configuration,
Firefox is on the slower side.

Still, Firefox seems the best for privacy. I like the fact that you can configure disabling obsolete insecure cipher suites, which you can't do on Safari or most other browsers. Some websites disable access because I'm so aggressive with shutting down "dynamic" ads.

I also use DuckDuckGo, which, conveniently, is in the App Store. I like the fact that it doesn't seem to mind infinite windows and tabs. The other things I like about the DuckDuckGo browser are the built-in JPEG-XL and the built-in DuckPlayer for YouTube. What I don't like is the lack of configuration options to, e.g., turn off old cipher suites. Still, DuckDuckGo is pretty good, and pretty fast, and good with ads.

Safari is OK. Fast, but, not the best wrt ads.

Chrome is at the bottom, obviously. The only thing I like about it is that it is fast.

On iOS variants, iPhone and iPad, I'm kind of stuck with Safari mostly, but, I still use DuckDuckGo a lot because it handles lots of tabs better and seems to have better privacy.
Click to expand...
I enjoy DuckDuckGo as well, it’s got good ad blocking support, and the Duck Players great. For me it just doesn’t have all the features and versatility Chrome. I still use DuckDuckGo as my search engine in Safari and Chrome.
 
I’m using DuckDuckGo. I have it on Macs, Phones, etc. I do some minor web development work and occasionally it throws a twist in there that needs Safari or Firebox to sort out, but not too often.
 
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