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Different topic, but can someone talk about which browser they use now? I’ve used Chrome for the past N years with ublock Origin, but recently I’ve been getting

Different topic, but can someone talk about which browser they use now? I’ve used Chrome for the past N years with ublock Origin, but recently I’ve been getting some ads on Youtube. Also some websites just didn’t work in Chrome. I switched to Brave a week ago and things seem ok, but it’s a weird browser with Tor built in, and also Spotify.com always crashes with a Memory problem. Does anyone have any thoughts on browser preference these days?

timeon 3y ago
Firefox is safe bet. But not sure why would Brave have special problem with Spotify, it is Chromium based.
ejb999 3y ago
I use brave exclusively for years - zero problems - seems faster to me than other options. Also use it with Spotify and can't remember ever having an issue (brave on mac if it makes a difference). Yes it has Tor built-in, but you don't ever need to use it - it's just there in case you do (I have never needed it myself).
web3-is-a-scam 3y ago
I’ve been using Firefox for nearly two decades and I’d be hard pressed to switch now. I’m practically married to it: through sickness and health.
dwighttk 3y ago
I use Brave for YouTube and things that require Chrome and Safari for everything else. Oh… Firefox for when I want to load Facebook. Like once a quarter.
polyvisual 3y ago
Brave is great. I disabled all the web3 stuff and tidied up the homepage so it doesn't show me all the news etc. The only issue I have is that the sync between my iphone, macbook, windows can sometimes get out of sync.
andyjohnson0 3y ago
I'm very happy with Firefox.
rplnt 3y ago
I hated Firefox for the longest time, because it was a sub-par browser with a cult following, but since Chrome ruined any competition I went through several chrome-based browsers (never Chrome itself due to severe lack of basic functionality) and am slowly ending up with FF as my primary browser. My standards have lowered substantially, and firefox is just good enough. Always using more browsers and trying something on the side, but while there are some nice features to be found, there is always a major drawback. I had high hopes with Vivaldi, but it's a broken mess that I can't recommend.
- malauxyeux 3y ago
  Would you mind saying what you would like to do but can't with FF? I don't think I'm part of a cult, but I've used FF as my default browser for over a decade and I guess I don't know what else people want from a browser.
  - rekoil 3y ago
    For me it's how user-defined search engines work. In Chromium-based browsers you can just supply a URL-template, a name, and a shorthand, and you're off to the races, it takes 10 seconds to add one. In Firefox it used to be you needed to like create your own little mini-addon or something like that, and these days they have "smart bookmarks", but it's such a weird name and doesn't really work the same. At any rate, I have 100 different little shortcuts defined like for example "tren" which takes the given text, puts it into a translator, and auto-detects language and translates to English. Ditto "sven", "ensv", "trsv", then I have "wiki", "wikise" (Wikipedia Sweden), "wikt", "aw" (ArchWiki), etc., etc. I use these hundreds of times a day, and when I tried converting to Firefox (before I eventually landed on Brave) I couldn't find a simple way of moving these from my Google Chrome profile to Firefox and have it work like I expect it to. Perhaps that's possible now?
    - Vinnl 3y ago
      It's not the same, and you can't import them from Chrome, but I'll share what works for me just in case it works for you as well. Which is: set DuckDuckGo as your default search engine, and use their "bangs" - you'll be able to guess most of them, and never have to set them up yourself. For example, you could use !deepl, !wiki, !wse, !wt, !aw, etc. etc. (If you do still want to use e.g. Google for search, you can use !g.)
rekoil 3y ago
Been using Brave since I think around 2019? Very happy with it, love the integration of IPFS, ENS, Unstoppable domains, and the removal of all the Google trash present in Chromium. Fully end-to-end encrypted sync as well. Don't use Tor much, but it's great that it's easily accessible if I need it.
alisonatwork 3y ago
Cromite[0] is the best on Android, it's a privacy-oriented open source patchset on top of Chromium. Cromite has a desktop build, but it's a bit more experimental than the mobile build, so you can use Ungoogled Chromium[1] instead. Ungoogled is also a privacy-oriented open source patchset on top of Chromium. Check the beta flags to enable some more interesting features like getClientRect anti-fingerprinting measures (unfortunately breaks some React-based sites that go into infinite re-render loop). Both of these browsers selectively include patches from Brave, but they are community-oriented builds so imo more trustworthy than Brave, which continues to package various shady anti-features and always will because it's backed by a for-profit company. LibreWolf[2] is the nicest Firefox-based one for desktop, I think. It's pretty hardcore, though, I most only use it to visit mainstream social media sites. I tried a bunch of the Firefox-based ones on mobile and none of them clicked for me. Cromite is just too slick on Android. Put the address bar at the bottom and off you go. Only downside is no online syncing of tabs and bookmarks, but meh. You can save all open tabs to bookmark bar in one hit then export your bookmarks, send the file through whatever E2EE channel you want to your other device, import and reopen them again. [0] https://github.com/uazo/cromite https://github.com/uazo/cromite [1] https://github.com/ungoogled-software/ungoogled-chromium https://github.com/ungoogled-software/ungoogled-chromium [2] https://librewolf.net/ https://librewolf.net/
Delumine 3y ago
I love edge, even before the AI stuff, it had a great feature set and less memory consumption than Chrome
Vinnl 3y ago
If ads, in particular on YouTube, are the problem, anything Chromium-based is probably only going to get worse and worse (see [1] and [2]). So that basically leaves you with Firefox and Safari. I work for Mozilla (speaking for myself, of course), so I'll leave you to guess which I'd recommend :P [1] https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/uBlock-Origin-works-best-on-Firefox https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/uBlock-Origin-works-b... [2] https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/09/googles-widely-opposed-ad-platform-the-privacy-sandbox-launches-in-chrome/ https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/09/googles-widely-oppos...
65 3y ago
I still use Chrome, mostly because I much prefer Chrome dev tools over any other dev tool options. And I have a bunch of custom browser extensions I've made for Chrome. I haven't had issues with uBlock Origin - very occasionally an ad will seep through on YouTube, maybe once every 6 months, but when that happens I refresh the page and the ad is gone. Safari is the new IE and Firefox I've always found to just be alright - for sure not as big of a fan of Firefox dev tools over Chrome dev tools. And Firefox scrolling behavior can be annoying.
alanjdev 3y ago
I use Safari for personal browsing, Firefox for work stuff (because my work machine is Windows). Firefox with uBlock Origin works quite well at keeping me mostly safe from ads.
bad_user 3y ago
I use Brave. It's a fine browser. The ad-blocking is almost on par with uBlock Origin. And I like its built-in Tor, BTW. I don't have any issues with Spotify.com, and it doesn't crash on me. I'm on a Macbook Pro M2 Max, and I also use it on a Galaxy S21U (Android). I tried using Firefox on and off, but it's sadly technically inferior to Chromium, and that gap has gotten worse. It still has things that it does better than Chromium browsers, like history sync actually working, or reader view. But those are few and far between. And Multi-Account Containers, one of its apparent advantages, comes with the caveat that Firefox doesn't have usable profiles and the security for its extensions is worse (e.g., no click to activate, no ability to disable extensions in certain containers). What finally pushed me to Chromium is the poor PWA support in Firefox. On Android, it has bugs that haven't been fixed for years (never mind the poor performance that's well known), and on desktop they've basically dropped the ball. I use several PWAs. If it's a chat app, I use it as a PWA. Also Spotify, since you mentioned it ... as I like having better sandboxing and ad-blocking in my apps. On Android, too.
kbelder 3y ago
I use Chrome for work on all my devices, and avoid any non-work browsing on it. It's an attempt to keep the two halves of my life apart. For all personal browsing and projects, I generally used Firefox, but switched over a couple years ago to using Brave on the phone, and am kind of half-transitioned from Firefox to Brave on desktop. I've been a Firefox user forever, but it's slowly losing me.
shever73 3y ago
I've been using Brave for a few years now. It's speedy enough, and does a great job of blocking ads and trackers. I've never had issues with Spotify and I like the auto-dismissing of cookie banners too.
PKop 3y ago
Firefox on Linux because touch-pad gestures for forward and back navigation don't work on Chromium browsers and also Firefox gives me a nice vertical tab setup with Tab Center Reborn + custom userChrome.css A tip I found recently in about:config browser.compact.show=true to bring back the compact layout option, results in very good use of space on laptop along with vertical tabs and also Firefox allows the vertical tabs to be moved to right side which is nice.
godelski 3y ago
Firefox I know what you're gonna say, but forgetting everything else there's one important factor you should consider. Chrome has a (near) monopoly and resolving that monopoly requires using non-chromium browsers. But on top of that, Firefox is fast, secure, has privacy in mind, and a rich set of add-ons. But most of that is true for any browser you pick. There really aren't big differences between browsers and often we're making mountains out of mole hills when we compare. But I'll say, firefox has ad-blocking on mobile (plugins on mobile, like 800 exist)
nyarlathotep_ 3y ago
Brave or Firefox with UBO a few userscripts, and a lightly tweaked user.js/userChrome for nice-looking tree-style tabs, in no particular order. Haven't had Chrome installed on any of my machines for ~5 years at this point. Not the biggest fan of Brave (especially considering this latest AI crap, and all the weird crypto stuff), but I'm satisfied with it overall. FF still remains #1 in my eyes and usage, but has to be tweaked to my liking.
AzzyHN 3y ago
Firefox + uBo. TOR browser uses Firefox as a base for a reason, and uBo works best on Firefox
soundnote 3y ago
Brave. I pretty much turn most things off and use it as a more private Chrome with vertical tabs.

timeon 3y ago

Firefox is safe bet. But not sure why would Brave have special problem with Spotify, it is Chromium based.

ejb999 3y ago

I use brave exclusively for years - zero problems - seems faster to me than other options. Also use it with Spotify and can't remember ever having an issue (brave on mac if it makes a difference). Yes it has Tor built-in, but you don't ever need to use it - it's just there in case you do (I have never needed it myself).

web3-is-a-scam 3y ago

I’ve been using Firefox for nearly two decades and I’d be hard pressed to switch now. I’m practically married to it: through sickness and health.

dwighttk 3y ago

I use Brave for YouTube and things that require Chrome and Safari for everything else. Oh… Firefox for when I want to load Facebook. Like once a quarter.

polyvisual 3y ago

Brave is great. I disabled all the web3 stuff and tidied up the homepage so it doesn't show me all the news etc. The only issue I have is that the sync between my iphone, macbook, windows can sometimes get out of sync.

andyjohnson0 3y ago

I'm very happy with Firefox.

rplnt 3y ago

I hated Firefox for the longest time, because it was a sub-par browser with a cult following, but since Chrome ruined any competition I went through several chrome-based browsers (never Chrome itself due to severe lack of basic functionality) and am slowly ending up with FF as my primary browser. My standards have lowered substantially, and firefox is just good enough. Always using more browsers and trying something on the side, but while there are some nice features to be found, there is always a major drawback. I had high hopes with Vivaldi, but it's a broken mess that I can't recommend.

malauxyeux 3y ago
Would you mind saying what you would like to do but can't with FF? I don't think I'm part of a cult, but I've used FF as my default browser for over a decade and I guess I don't know what else people want from a browser.
- rekoil 3y ago
  For me it's how user-defined search engines work. In Chromium-based browsers you can just supply a URL-template, a name, and a shorthand, and you're off to the races, it takes 10 seconds to add one. In Firefox it used to be you needed to like create your own little mini-addon or something like that, and these days they have "smart bookmarks", but it's such a weird name and doesn't really work the same. At any rate, I have 100 different little shortcuts defined like for example "tren" which takes the given text, puts it into a translator, and auto-detects language and translates to English. Ditto "sven", "ensv", "trsv", then I have "wiki", "wikise" (Wikipedia Sweden), "wikt", "aw" (ArchWiki), etc., etc. I use these hundreds of times a day, and when I tried converting to Firefox (before I eventually landed on Brave) I couldn't find a simple way of moving these from my Google Chrome profile to Firefox and have it work like I expect it to. Perhaps that's possible now?
  - Vinnl 3y ago
    It's not the same, and you can't import them from Chrome, but I'll share what works for me just in case it works for you as well. Which is: set DuckDuckGo as your default search engine, and use their "bangs" - you'll be able to guess most of them, and never have to set them up yourself. For example, you could use !deepl, !wiki, !wse, !wt, !aw, etc. etc. (If you do still want to use e.g. Google for search, you can use !g.)

rekoil 3y ago

Been using Brave since I think around 2019? Very happy with it, love the integration of IPFS, ENS, Unstoppable domains, and the removal of all the Google trash present in Chromium. Fully end-to-end encrypted sync as well. Don't use Tor much, but it's great that it's easily accessible if I need it.

alisonatwork 3y ago

Cromite[0] is the best on Android, it's a privacy-oriented open source patchset on top of Chromium. Cromite has a desktop build, but it's a bit more experimental than the mobile build, so you can use Ungoogled Chromium[1] instead. Ungoogled is also a privacy-oriented open source patchset on top of Chromium. Check the beta flags to enable some more interesting features like getClientRect anti-fingerprinting measures (unfortunately breaks some React-based sites that go into infinite re-render loop). Both of these browsers selectively include patches from Brave, but they are community-oriented builds so imo more trustworthy than Brave, which continues to package various shady anti-features and always will because it's backed by a for-profit company. LibreWolf[2] is the nicest Firefox-based one for desktop, I think. It's pretty hardcore, though, I most only use it to visit mainstream social media sites. I tried a bunch of the Firefox-based ones on mobile and none of them clicked for me. Cromite is just too slick on Android. Put the address bar at the bottom and off you go. Only downside is no online syncing of tabs and bookmarks, but meh. You can save all open tabs to bookmark bar in one hit then export your bookmarks, send the file through whatever E2EE channel you want to your other device, import and reopen them again. [0] https://github.com/uazo/cromite https://github.com/uazo/cromite [1] https://github.com/ungoogled-software/ungoogled-chromium https://github.com/ungoogled-software/ungoogled-chromium [2] https://librewolf.net/ https://librewolf.net/

Delumine 3y ago

I love edge, even before the AI stuff, it had a great feature set and less memory consumption than Chrome

Vinnl 3y ago

If ads, in particular on YouTube, are the problem, anything Chromium-based is probably only going to get worse and worse (see [1] and [2]). So that basically leaves you with Firefox and Safari. I work for Mozilla (speaking for myself, of course), so I'll leave you to guess which I'd recommend :P [1] https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/uBlock-Origin-works-best-on-Firefox https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/uBlock-Origin-works-b... [2] https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/09/googles-widely-opposed-ad-platform-the-privacy-sandbox-launches-in-chrome/ https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/09/googles-widely-oppos...

65 3y ago

I still use Chrome, mostly because I much prefer Chrome dev tools over any other dev tool options. And I have a bunch of custom browser extensions I've made for Chrome. I haven't had issues with uBlock Origin - very occasionally an ad will seep through on YouTube, maybe once every 6 months, but when that happens I refresh the page and the ad is gone. Safari is the new IE and Firefox I've always found to just be alright - for sure not as big of a fan of Firefox dev tools over Chrome dev tools. And Firefox scrolling behavior can be annoying.

alanjdev 3y ago

I use Safari for personal browsing, Firefox for work stuff (because my work machine is Windows). Firefox with uBlock Origin works quite well at keeping me mostly safe from ads.

bad_user 3y ago

I use Brave. It's a fine browser. The ad-blocking is almost on par with uBlock Origin. And I like its built-in Tor, BTW. I don't have any issues with Spotify.com, and it doesn't crash on me. I'm on a Macbook Pro M2 Max, and I also use it on a Galaxy S21U (Android). I tried using Firefox on and off, but it's sadly technically inferior to Chromium, and that gap has gotten worse. It still has things that it does better than Chromium browsers, like history sync actually working, or reader view. But those are few and far between. And Multi-Account Containers, one of its apparent advantages, comes with the caveat that Firefox doesn't have usable profiles and the security for its extensions is worse (e.g., no click to activate, no ability to disable extensions in certain containers). What finally pushed me to Chromium is the poor PWA support in Firefox. On Android, it has bugs that haven't been fixed for years (never mind the poor performance that's well known), and on desktop they've basically dropped the ball. I use several PWAs. If it's a chat app, I use it as a PWA. Also Spotify, since you mentioned it ... as I like having better sandboxing and ad-blocking in my apps. On Android, too.

kbelder 3y ago

I use Chrome for work on all my devices, and avoid any non-work browsing on it. It's an attempt to keep the two halves of my life apart. For all personal browsing and projects, I generally used Firefox, but switched over a couple years ago to using Brave on the phone, and am kind of half-transitioned from Firefox to Brave on desktop. I've been a Firefox user forever, but it's slowly losing me.

shever73 3y ago

I've been using Brave for a few years now. It's speedy enough, and does a great job of blocking ads and trackers. I've never had issues with Spotify and I like the auto-dismissing of cookie banners too.

PKop 3y ago

Firefox on Linux because touch-pad gestures for forward and back navigation don't work on Chromium browsers and also Firefox gives me a nice vertical tab setup with Tab Center Reborn + custom userChrome.css A tip I found recently in about:config browser.compact.show=true to bring back the compact layout option, results in very good use of space on laptop along with vertical tabs and also Firefox allows the vertical tabs to be moved to right side which is nice.

godelski 3y ago

Firefox I know what you're gonna say, but forgetting everything else there's one important factor you should consider. Chrome has a (near) monopoly and resolving that monopoly requires using non-chromium browsers. But on top of that, Firefox is fast, secure, has privacy in mind, and a rich set of add-ons. But most of that is true for any browser you pick. There really aren't big differences between browsers and often we're making mountains out of mole hills when we compare. But I'll say, firefox has ad-blocking on mobile (plugins on mobile, like 800 exist)

nyarlathotep_ 3y ago

Brave or Firefox with UBO a few userscripts, and a lightly tweaked user.js/userChrome for nice-looking tree-style tabs, in no particular order. Haven't had Chrome installed on any of my machines for ~5 years at this point. Not the biggest fan of Brave (especially considering this latest AI crap, and all the weird crypto stuff), but I'm satisfied with it overall. FF still remains #1 in my eyes and usage, but has to be tweaked to my liking.

AzzyHN 3y ago

Firefox + uBo. TOR browser uses Firefox as a base for a reason, and uBo works best on Firefox

soundnote 3y ago

Brave. I pretty much turn most things off and use it as a more private Chrome with vertical tabs.