Hunt for a new browser

I have been a user of Arc as my daily browser for a long time it took a while to get into but once it clicked I hated anything else.

Then they started developing Dia and then they were brought, the writing was on the wall and I tried Safari but well it’s Safari. So back I went to Arc but security updates only and they had added more features to Dia so the writing on the wall was big and flashing so my hunt for a replacement started in earnest.

There has to be a browser out there that is as good as Arc.

Maybe we should cover off why Dia is not for me: I don’t want or need an AI focused browser especially these days when AI tools like ChatGPT and Claude can search the internet from in there apps. Don’t get me wrong I am not against AI I use it all the time but I don’t want it/need it to be the cornerstone of my browser.\n\nI have tried a good few browsers some have been binned practically as soon as I opened them and some have stuck a bit longer. There is a Firefox based browser that seems to be a clone of Arc (only Firefox rather than Chromium) that should be interesting but it just felt ‘wrong’ there is any number of chrome based browsers that offer privacy or other features but they are fundamentally chrome.

So how about Safari? Well its not good is it at least on the Mac (iOS is probably better) it tries to do things that help in the modern world like profiles but the execution is just not there. I was on a call the other day and dev on the call said: “Safari is the new Internet Explorer” now I think that is a bit harsh but it is also depending on the angle you are looking at it not far off.

Were have I landed well I don’t think I have yet but the browser that i have been using day to day for the last few weeks is Orion. I am an Apple user apart from Linux servers all I use is Apple devices, I also am very bad at closing tabs - right now writing this I am in a ‘Profile’ I created this morning and it has over 15 tabs open and I have multiple profiles with similar or more tabs. Orion handles this with ease and a speed that is hard to beat. Is it perfect definitely not is it what Safari should be no I don’t think so. But it is good enough for me: maybe it currently feels nice - however and this is a couple of big ones:

1. I am mostly on my Laptop screen at the moment I think that split screen feature of Arc will be missed once I get to my big desk screen.
2. I will always need to have a Chrome based browser installed alongside Orion to handle things that do not work in a WebKit based browser