What's your go-to web browser for 2021?

[Ivan Lima]

Hey everyone. I'm sure that many people like me are always trying new browsers. Although there are many benchmarks out there analyzing performance, security and privacy, cross-platform compatibility/portability, utilities (e.g., extensions, tab and bookmark managers, etc.), in the end, it boils down to the experience and usage that each one has with it.

For example, when I'm on my macOS, I've been switching between Chrome and Brave. Very similar overall but Brave has been getting my attention lately. Unfortunately, both eat memory and battery like crazy—Safari when not power-wired. Another reason that still brings me to stick with those two is the ability to have web-based apps - which, according to this blog post and timeline, will die soon.

What about you? What is your favourite one, and what makes you choose it as the go-to browser for 2021?

[Soumyadeep Mandal - SaM]

Hey @Ivan Lima ,

Well, I use many browsers but the two main browsers that I use are Brave & Edge. Both the browser is chromium-based and use lots of CPU & RAM.

[Ivan Lima]

Yeah, I noticed that many people are now using Brave as their go-to browse rather than Chrome. In your case, what does make you switch between Brave and Edge?

[Soumyadeep Mandal - SaM]

I don't use edge! I just update it and check for new features because it was edge beta version.

[Michael Schulze]

I use Edge only for testing issues 

[Sudarshan]

Hello @Ivan Lima 
I have been using Vivaldi (good for tab stacking) and lots of in built functionalities. (split browser view, new way to see the history (calendar view) and i have been using this for the last 5 years.

other we browser - > Google Chrome. Brave (beginner) 

[Ivan Lima]

I tried Vivaldi once, but I don't remember why I decided not to use it anymore. Maybe I should give it another try.

[Taranjeet Singh]

I have been using Chrome and Edge browsers personally and professionally, and I have not faced any major issues with them, except that they eat up a lot of CPU and Memory resources.

[Henri Seymour _Easy Agile_]

I prefer to use Firefox at home, partially because I'm unsettled by Chrome's growing monopoly (currently at 63%). 

At work though, having it sync'd with multiple separate Google accounts (work, home, etc) makes Chrome genuinely more useful. I like keeping things a little separate but still being able to switch easily between my accounts and between computers. 

[Tom Kakanowski]

I use all the main variants depending on need, but my goto remains Firefox for now, for security and extensibility.  I don't sync or share with Google, so I'm not driven to Chrome, but I often use Chrome when doing web dev work as I like the available tools.  Edge for me is really just for compatibility testing and occasional cases where I cant get a site to render well on FF or Chrome for some reason.

[Michael Schulze]

I use 4 Browser (Safari, Chrome, Firefox and Opera).  Edge only for business duties 

[Eva Kasiak]

I love using Firefox and Google Chrome. These two are fast, handy, have a nice interface, and as always reliable. In Chrome one of my favs is the DuckDuckGo extension which keeps searching and browsing secure and private. Plus I always use Pocket - which is a cloud library for favorite sites. I can group them, tag, and keep them in the cloud with access anytime and anywhere to my saved sites. 

[Nir Arad]

I mostly use Chrome. Memory is cheap enough so that all of my servers and desktops have 16GB-32GB.

I use Firefox on some of my older laptops, for a funky reason: I use ZoneMinder, and for some reason, Chrome does not cache the login password, while Firefox does.

[Marc Ter Dam]

I usually use Edge to check my site VR Games

Because with Edge it's easy to see if there's something wrong with it!

[Helga And Heini On Tour]

Still in love with the chrome browser. Runs fast and best usability. According to our travel blog stats, most of our users also prefer Chrome.

[Patrick Arche]

I primarily use Chrome on the day to day. I just have gotten use to the functionalities of Chrome versus other browsers, but outside of Chrome, i also lightly use Firefox. I rarely (.000001% of my desktime) use Edge, but haven't really explored the features.

[Eric Anderson]

Brave is the default.  It leaves out the phone-home-to-Google communications embedded in Chrome, has better default blocking, and has everything worthwhile that Chrome has, including but not limited to Extensions (since they are both Chromium based).

Aside from that, I sometimes cross over to Edge (now also Chromium based).  For some things, Windows is happier with that.

I've used Firefox in the past, but not so much currently.  If I needed to go non-Chromium, I would probably head there.

[Eric Anderson]

Update:

On iOS or iPadOS, I am moving more exclusively toward Brave and/or Safari because of one uncommon feature.

On iOS or iPadOS (at least, I don't know about Android), both Brave and Safari have a setting that will automatically Close Tabs that are unused for some period of time (e.g. a day, a week, or a month) in contrast to having to manually close all tabs.  While I like to start a session where I left off before, I find that it is far too easy for a large number of tabs to accumulate.  By setting an automatic time limit for tabs that have remained unused, that is a valued benefit for tab management.

At the present, I haven't seen any other browsers on those systems that yet have this feature.  (It would be nice if the feature would also show up before too long on the desktop editions of these browsers.)

[Marco Morales]

I use Chrome first, and Edge second.  Our work uses Google Suite, so it is more convenient to use Chrome for a lot of work related stuff.
I tested Edge for nearly six months and learned that I liked it well enough.  The biggest obstacle is that I did miss out on the natural google integrations for shortcuts if you are embedded in GSuite.  I especially liked how tabs would sleep, meaning utilizing fewer resources.

My machine has plenty of RAM - 64GB, so I don't feel the same pain as others with RAM usage or running out of CPU.  I've noticed in recent times 

[Benyamin Limanto]

Well this is 2023. I always use Firefox for everything, and PWA with EdgeCR for Microsoft product... as on Linux, there are no native app for teams or even for outlook (there are thunderbird, just I don't think at work it's useful, as all data are managed via sharepoint tho).

So that's all.

Firefox is the frontier of the web, so we need to keep using it, as it's very useful for everything, and the only one defending the web standard while maintaining in built web engine, only firefox.

so Cheers!