What’s your favorite browser for a desktop running Windows, and why?
Chrome is irritating the hell out of me and I can’t fix the issue so I may just abandon ship.
I’ve been using Slimjet for a few months, and I’m very happy with it.
It uses the same underlying engine as Chrome, but it’s different and better.
It’s faster and smaller than Chrome, with many improvements like built-in ad-blocking, privacy, and anti-tracking. It has many useful extra features and good customization options, and it can also use Chrome extensions and themes.
It works well, and I haven’t had any problems with it.
I use Edge for 90% or more of my browsing tbh. Its fast, secure and …just works. I know, I know… but Edge is really quite a decent browser and nothing like what you may remember about Explorer. Ok… now… if I have anyone STILL reading this after recommending Edge, lol, I also use Firefox just because its different and very good. I also use Brave. Just started using Brave I must admit but so far its excellent! Has everything Chrome, that abomination, has and is Chromium based. Yes, just like Chrome but without all the trackers and crap Google Inc (yes, I know the parent company is named Alphabet) decides it needs to shove down your throat.
Brave doesn’t have a supported portable version, and I like to use portable versions where possible.
I’m also a bit dubious about their Brave Rewards system for watching ads. What’s your experience with this?
I tried Brave, but became irritated by things not loading properly. Specifically tweets embedded in articles. Is there some setting that I’ve not found? I have the “social media blocking” toggles set to allow everything, but it still doesn’t work. Any suggestions?
Slimjet handles this correctly. Their ad blocker is very effective, but you can still see embedded tweets.
You can also tweak ad-block settings by site, and disable javascript by site. It also has cookie control by site.
I had no idea that there were alternatives to Chrome, lol.
Seriously, I used to love Chrome, especially back in 2008 when I thought Google had some scruples. But Chrome has gradually nudged itself over to the high end of my ‘creepy’ scale with some of its moves as of late, and it’s just getting slower and more bloated with crap. I mainly use it because I use Chromecast a lot and it seems to function better in Chrome, but I will probably switch over at some point.
I use Firefox; just wish it were faster.
I use Chrome at work and at home on my computers – what do you find irritating?
On my Android phone, I mostly use Firefox because you get get an adblocker for it. You can’t get that for mobile Chrome as far as I can tell.
ETA: I think the new versions of Edge are actually Chromium as well.
This. I got tired of Google’s creepy games with spying on my browser use, hiding my logged in status, etc. Before Chrome I used Firefox and abandoned ship because it was so slow and buggy. In the intervening years, Firefox got rewritten or something because now it’s quite fast and I’m enjoying it. I find it as fast or faster than Chrome.
It says I have a quarter penny to donate lol. I mainly use it for a game I play online and very little else at this point tbh. On the other hand… not that its pertinent to your question … I DO have over $100 in Microsoft rewards money atm. Probably use it to get a $100 Target gift card, maybe a new controller. I’ve made well over $500 on their rewards and heartily recommend it. Takes me less than 15 minutes a day to max mine out. I also donate approximately $5 a month, sometimes more to various charitiesvwith those rewards.
I like newest version of Firefox much less than the older, more customizable one but it still annoys me less than Chrome.
You must have been accumulating Microsoft Rewards for some time.
According to this article, by searching with Bing 50 times a day, completing 5 offers a day, and actively browsing with Microsoft Edge for a month, you can earn up to… (gasp) $9/month.
Indeed, I signed up the first day they had it lol. There many many other once a day offers too. I haven’t really paid any attention to my daily totals tbh. Think I get 200 a day from searching (which I do by typing in the first word to come into my head, then another , then another …etc until I’ve maxed that part. Then do the short quiz and then the 2 question poll (which is better strawberry ice cream or chocolate ice cream) then any offers at bottom… “look at us doing good things for people” type of thing.You also get points for days in a row visiting the rewards page. I have a dumb phone so I can’t get the mobile search points. But guess I’ve been saving these … about a year I guess. Got a free xbox controller last spring/summer sometime. I do give to charities but usually not much if I’m saving for something. Like I said… 15 minutes a day tops. Usually while drinking first cup of coffee for the day and barely awake/human. Hey… its free money. Have 93,500 points as we speak. Enough for a $100 gift card to Target or Walmart etc.
I use Firefox, and I like it. But I’m afraid to update it because the last time I did that I lost my bookmarks and the interface changed a bunch.
Forgot to mention… that article is a bit dated. Example, there’s one quiz I did today that itself was worth 50 points. I’ve never had any of the problems mentioned either tbh. Points were always there and on time and never had a problem redeeming them either.
I’d be extremely wary of choosing a browser not by the big 4 (Microsoft, Google, Apple, Mozilla) because of the security threats. The attack vectors on browsers are huge, especially once small teams start making modifications to them without the security expertise and resources of a huge global tech company. I especially wouldn’t trust any password syncing that they may do.
As for the big 4, Edge is basically Chrome by Microsoft. Safari is webkit, a cousin of Chrome. Both are good choices. Firefox was a strong contender in the past, but it’s losing market share every year, and with the rest of the industry converging on Webkit/Blink, Firefox probably won’t survive long in terms of being able to keep up with changing standards. Google has become the new Microsoft in that they singlehandedly push for a lot of changes to browser technologies, and Firefox has to play catchup. Firefox is also largely funded by Google, so once Big Daddy decides to stop giving them an allowance, they’re probably have to shut down. They just laid off a bunch of people recently.
The original vision of the internet as an open platform has largely been replaced by a tech duopoly between Apple and Google. Aside from Firefox, all other browsers are really just skins on top of the same webkit/Blink core.
Opera. Does everything I want from a browser. Has introduced many features that the other browsers took from it (restore sessions, block ads, remember passwords) and is much less of a memory hog than Chrome.
Chrome.
Second choice is Opera.
I still use Firefox, I know where all the settings are.
Chrome is a pig and I don’t trust Google. I don’t have incognito or adblocker set up on Chrome so I use it when I really want to read an article on a site that won’t allow incognito.
The problem with Firefox, and I don’t know how much of a problem it is with other browsers, is that as sites are increasingly designed to be used on phones, sometimes there’s controls that don’t work (or don’t even show up) in Firefox.
I’ve never had this problem with Brave. No idea why it isn’t working for you.