I’m looking for a new browser

I’m a Supreme Hunter on the Arc browser. It has been the default browser on my Mac for over three years now. I even used to tell others about it like it was my duty. Unfortunately, this relationship is coming to an end. Arc went defunct a year ago when Atlassian bought it. Since then, I have been on a lookout for a worthy replacement.

I have tried a few browsers across my requirement spectrum. Few things are clear.

1. Chrome is not an option (a separate rant), even if it gets vertical tabs (update: it did)
2. Commercial browsers are out too, like Brave, Opera etc.
3. Battery performance that comes with WebKit is marginally better than what you would get with anything else
4. Just the right amount of AI in browser, like Arc’s Tidy Tabs or Tab Naming is the only AI I need
5. I love vertical tabs and I have also developed a subconscious muscle memory for Cmd+L, Cmd+S and Opt+1, 2 etc.

Most popular replacement right now, is its own biggest enemy Zen browser, which is the closest, most stable replacement for Arc. Sadly, based on Firefox, which itself is in a weird soup right now. Zen is great. It is lighter than Firefox and takes a lot of design cues from Arc. They have a very active community and are constantly pushing updates. It is just a bit too heavy for my liking, and I really feel the base is a big compromise.

AI and the memory choking world of Chrome forks Helium is like Chrome, but better and Google completely stripped out of it. Surprisingly, it is comparable for battery performance to other Chrome forks like itself. It is very clear with what it wants to be, and its focus on privacy and security. Great if you are a developer, default to Chrome. Your switch will be smooth af. Unfortunately, not the default material for my use case.

All the AI browsers are assistive but not really a default browser material right now. Dia is good but now they have a paid plan and I don’t know where they want to go with it. Comet is the best assistive AI browser, so much better than ChatGPT Atlas. Both Chrome forks, equally bad for battery and memory management. It is very sad to see that all these AI browsers are doing everything but bring AI to the browsing experience. Like, I repeat, tidy tabs on Arc. I use it once a day and it is part of my process now. There are a lot of other Chrome forks I tried. Some of the most interesting, upcoming browsers are Chrome based. Norton has one, Zoho too. A lot of productivity play. I will do a separate post on that, someday.

I want a Safari, dressed as Arc In the post-Arc development rush, WebKit suddenly saw a lot of love coming its way. Kagi’s Orion used to be the only Safari alternative, completely based on WebKit. However, in the last year, a lot of other browsers have popped up. Most of them are native, WebKit browsers with UI heavily inspired by Arc. Like vertical tabs, pins and bookmarks etc.

Unfortunately, only a few have managed to survive beyond a few months of active development. I actually went deep into this rabbit hole of indie WebKit browsers. Almost all of them are either single-person projects or, tiny teams with limited resources, doing their best to sustain. Out of all of them, I found my liking in Nook and Ora (open-source) and Click. There is Emerald too, but it is private-owned, no open-code, no third-party audits etc. They have done a good job with UI (more like overdone Arc) and are available cross-platform.

I did try to keep Safari as my default when on browser, but even the half-baked experience of Ora or Nook was better than Safari’s all over the place design. It is simple and clean. It will work for most people. However, my likings have been heavily influenced by Arc and Safari feels like a step back (the wrong type) and a hindrance to my workflow. I even tried to use Safari as my leisure browser. In those few minutes of browsing weekly, I experience the famous YouTube problem. Details on it later, in a separate post. However, when it comes to performance on Apple Silicon, Safari is the best. It is understandable why it is the best browser for MacOS. No details needed. Battery is good, resource usage is good, memory management is good. Sadly, no vertical tabs on a sidebar. No, the tabs list is not the same thing as vertical tabs.

Returning to the dead roses Eventually, I came back to Arc, hoping and wishing the best for Nook and Ora. They are the closest to what I want — Safari inside, dressed as Arc on the outside. It also made me realise how important and impactful Arc managed to be, in a very short time. On their Reddit community, you will find odes to the browser, how people have changed their workflow (or, developed one) around Arc. Users also often post requests to open source the browser, but that’s highly unlikely to happen. While they have officially ended any development on Arc and are fully focused on Dia right now — the team is very active on Reddit and often help queue few glitches and bug fixes in upcoming patch updates.

And when the roses dry out? I have high hopes for Ora to take off and similarly, more promising WebKit developments to kick in. However, there is no stable option right now. Again, Zen comes the closest when you look for Arc-like experience and stability, but I’d rather use Chrome than a Firefox fork.

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