Chrome, Edge, Firefox, Opera, or Safari: Which Browser Is Best for 2024?

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Most people browse the web using Google Chrome without really thinking about their options. Gmail, YouTube, or some other site once suggested they use Chrome, and perhaps you never questioned it. The truth is, you do have options when it comes to your web browser, and you may find another that serves your needs better. Browsers offer varying levels of efficiency, performance, privacy, and security. They differ even more when it comes to unique and helpful features beyond merely displaying websites. PCMag has been evaluating web browsers since the dawn of the internet in the late '90s, so we have the expertise to inform your decision. Here, we examine the top five browsers in the US in order of popularity, and provide advice on how to choose the best one for your needs.

What's the Best Web Browser Overall?

For the last several years, Google has dominated the browser landscape. The same company that serves more web content than any other (according to Comscore) also claims more than 65% of the worldwide browser market share with Chrome, based on numbers from StatCounter and W3Counter. That’s for desktop use, but Chrome is still king on mobile, too. So dominant is Chrome that most other browsers now use its underlying Chromium rendering code; Firefox is the only remaining top-to-bottom independent competitor.

Chrome might be leading in usage (except, of course, on Apple devices), but it’s not ahead by every measure or in a number of capabilities. Firefox, Edge, Safari, and Opera all have features not available in Google's browser. That’s not to say that Chrome isn't an excellent piece of software, but you should know that there are worthy alternatives.

Which Web Browser Has the Best Compatibility?

The web markup standard that underlies all webpages, HTML5, fully launched in 2014 after a decade of work, though it continues to evolve with new features. There have been murmurings around the web about a new HTML6 version, but that doesn't seem likely. The rival W3C and WHATWG organizations that developed the standard have signed an agreement, and HTML now has no version number. It's a "living standard."

I used to check browsers with the HTML5test website, which evaluated their compatibility with the moving target of web standards. But the developer of that site now states that the test is finished, having served its purpose of pushing browser makers to support the new standard. "HTML5 is now generally supported, and there aren't any truly bad browsers anymore," writes the test creator, Niels Leenheer. Reinforcing that opinion is the Web Standards Project, which posted an article entitled "Our Work Here Is Done."

Which Web Browser Is Fastest?

At this point, you won’t notice much of a speed difference between browsers: They all feel fast and responsive. Nevertheless, thorough technology-testing outfit that we are here at PCMag, we put each browser through its paces with three synthetic benchmarks. We use the JetStream and Speedometer benchmarks from browserbench.org, and WebXPRT 4 from Principled Technologies.

JetStream "combines a variety of JavaScript and Web Assembly benchmarks, covering a variety of advanced workloads and programming techniques." It takes the geometric mean of test results, and higher scores are better. Speedometer is a quick-to-run benchmark that simulates adding, completing, and removing to-do items in a web app. WebXPRT is the most time-consuming benchmark. It runs through several categories of operations to test performance, including AI photo recognition and encryption.

We tested on a with a Core i7 processor running and a running , shutting down unnecessary processes and reporting the of five test runs. To see just one platform or the other, click on the OS names in the chart headers above.

Take benchmark results with a grain of salt since purely synthetic tests don’t necessarily translate to real-world experiences. Note, too, that the scores are similar across most of the browsers we tested because they use the same Chromium rendering code. Firefox has fallen behind on both platforms in most of the tests, but it does well in the more exhaustive WebXPRT test. Note that using the Enhanced Security mode in Edge lowers its scores drastically, though that extra protection doesn't much affect everyday browsing speeds.

Which Web Browser Is Best for Privacy?

Of the browsers here, Firefox and Opera are your best options for privacy. If that's your main concern, check out our other suggestions in the aforementioned roundup of the best private browsers.

All browsers can now remember passwords for you and sync them (in encrypted form) across mobile and desktop apps. The same goes for bookmarks and browsing history. Chrome, by default, signs you into Google services like Gmail and YouTube, though that raises some privacy concerns.

Privacy mavens like to use virtual private networks (VPNs) to hide browsing activities from ISPs and any other entities that intervene between you and the site you’re visiting. Opera is the only browser here that includes a built-in VPN. Firefox offers a paid VPN, and its private mode not only discards a session’s history and cookies but also hides your activities from third-party tracking sites.

Firefox implements DNS over HTTPS, which hides your web address lookups from your ISP. In addition, Edge, Firefox, and Safari include some fingerprint protection, meaning they try to prevent trackers from identifying you based on your hardware and software setup. One test of this is the EFF's Cover Your Tracks site, which reports the level of tracking protection. Some browsers also have built-in Content Blocking to fend off known trackers and cryptocurrency-mining ploys.

Which Web Browser Has the Best Tools?

AI features, convenience tools, customization, and tab and start page tools are now today's primary differentiators. These can all play a part in your decision. For example, Reading Mode strips webpages of clutter, such as ads and videos, so you can focus on text. Another is the Share button. With this era’s obsession with social media, it’s a nearly essential convenience.

Opera is alone among the popular web browsers currently having a built-in cryptocurrency wallet (the Brave browser also has one). Opera also stands out for its Speed Dial, which consists of pinned tiles on your home screen and a toolbar for accessing services you frequently need, such as WhatsApp.

Microsoft Edge offers the Copilot generative AI assistant, voice-reading of webpages with remarkably realistic speech, a helpfully customizable homepage, detailed privacy settings, and a Collections feature for research. Firefox lets you instantly save a page to Pocket or open a new Container for logging into the same site with two different identities. Screenshot tools are making their way into browsers, with Edge, Firefox, and Opera now having them.

What Should You Use Instead of Internet Explorer?

The browser wars continue, but one competitor is gone forever: Microsoft's Internet Explorer. As of June 15, 2022, the once-indisputable leader in browser market share and the one that paved the way for interactive web applications no longer receives support. Microsoft has shifted its focus to the new Edge web browser.

If you still need IE to run an old web app, you can still get it in Edge's IE Mode.

Even More Browser Choices

If you want to go beyond the mainstream for your web browser choice, read about our favorite alternative web browsers, including Brave and Vivaldi. You can further change things up with an alternative search engine or even an AI search engine.