andsln.com

All about web browsers

Introduction

For most of us choosing a browser is something trivial and isn’t given much thought, as we, in general, tend to go with what we’re used to.

Over the last couple of years I’ve been “browser-hopping”, and it has lead me to a simple conclusion: The more secure/private, the more obnoxious.

I was planning on going one by one but that would get boring quick and there’s really not much to say about each one of them individually, so instead I’ll go over what I want from a web browser and what I’ve settled on for the moment (TL;DR at the bottom).

What’s a browser good for?

A browser is just an ends to a means, as in and of itself is not really useful.

What I’m trying to say is that it shouldn’t get in the way of my browsing. It needs to be as simple and clutter free as possible, no flashy colors, no unnecessary sidebars, no built-in VPN, no crypto bullshit, no built-in apps, no adblocker, no password manager, no accounts.

It does however, for me, need good passkey support (iCloud Passkeys in particular)

What’s your privacy worth?

I like to think of myself as someone who values privacy, but keeping in mind what we said earlier about a browser being just a tool, what are we using our browser for?

That’s a question each of you will have to answer, and it will, in turn, determine your options. Here’s what I use mine for:

As we can see, these are all less than ideal pages to visit if we don’t want to be tracked. Aside from maybe forums (which are still indexed by Google ¯\(ツ)/¯), what do I care if Google has my browsing history, when all I’m doing is use Google products 90% of the time?

What to avoid

The idea is to stray away from anything focused towards a particular audience. For example:

Another general rule is to say away from companies outside your environment/jurisdiction. An example would be living in the US and using a Russian browser or vice versa.

It’s all just Chromium

It all comes down to Firefox, Safari or Chrome. But if you’re going to use one of the browsers mentioned above, just use Chrome.

Now, what about Firefox and Safari? TL;DR: Both work great until they don’t.

I’ve used both extensively and there’s always that obscure website that requires Chrome to work. You could argue that I could just have both Firefox and Chrome installed, but why go through the hassle?

Enough rambling, what should I use?

I’ll be quick, as you’re probably bored by now.

Browser Notes
Opera, Yandex Avoid it.
Brave Good enough if you disable the crypto stuff, meant for a privacy-minded individual with low technical knowledge.
Arc I find it cumbersome.
Firefox If you dislike Chromium, this is a good option.
Floorp Firefox fork, take it as a better Firefox.
Hardened Firefox A lot of stuff will break, I’d use this if I were paranoid.
Safari Don’t use anything else on iOS, it’s all just WebKit for now.
Chromium Lacks basic features like DRM support and isn’t even de-googled.
Ungoogled Chromium Very frustrating to use.
Thorium Best Chrome fork out there imo. There’s been some controversy with the dev in the past.
Chrome Untick a couple of boxes in the settings, install a couple of extensions and get to work.
Other Avoid it unless you know something I don’t.

TL;DR

As of the time of writing, here’s what I’m using:

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