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Quit Chrome. Safari and Edge Are Just Better Browsers for You and Your Computer

WSJ via DowJones/Fidelity: “…while Chrome has gobbled up 69% of the desktop-laptop browser market share, according to NetMarketShare, its competitors, all with single-digit percentages, have been laser-focused on kicking Chrome square in the blue dot. Microsoft’s new Edge browser, rolling out to Windows 10 machines this summer and available now for download on a Mac, is based on Chromium, the same underlying technology as Chrome — yet it uses less of your Windows computer’s RAM and battery. An independent, Mozilla’s Firefox, the Bernie Sanders of browsers, now puts privacy front and center. Meanwhile, Apple’s built-in Safari browser has the best blend of privacy, performance and battery to offer on Macs, and it’s only getting better this fall with MacOS Big Sur…Unsurprisingly, on Macs, it was also the built-in browser that performed the best. Companies that create the operating systems can do more to optimize for their own browsers. Both Microsoft and Apple said they work a lot on how to minimize processor and memory demands from inactive tabs.Safari used about 5% to 10% less RAM than Chrome, Firefox and Edge in my tests. Compared with Chrome, Safari kept the 13-inch MacBook Pro running an extra 1 to 2 hours on a charge. Plus, the laptop was a lot cooler and quieter, with the exception of in-browser video calls….Yes, Microsoft’s browser is great on Apple machines, too. Mind blown. But the podcast web app, like some other sites, just won’t run unless it identifies a Chrome browser. ..In the next release of Safari coming this fall in MacOS Big Sur, Apple made it easier for developers to port Chrome extensions over. Plus, the updated browser, which I’ve been testing in beta on a MacBook Pro, is faster — and has those little tab icons, aka favicons, turned on by default. Like Firefox and Edge, Safari’s also has lots of default privacy features, including tracker blocking. The forthcoming version includes a toolbar that lets you see the blocked trackers on the site you’re visiting, and a new weekly privacy report shows you all blocked trackers — even across your iPhone and iPad…”

 

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