We are pleased to continue our comparisons of the major browsers. Since we last published comparisons 5 years ago, see Browser Comparisons – Archive, there have been major changes in operating systems and the browsers. Windows 7, 8 and 8.1 reached EoL (End of Life) and all the Microsoft browsers that were in use before the introduction of the Chromium-based Edge are also gone. We are unable to provide information about the performance in Windows 11, but it should be at least as good as in Windows 10. This means that there are far fewer differences in performance in the present versions of the browsers and even with SVG most browsers have 83% recognition. The differences may be more affected by the operating systems on which they are used especially in the case of Windows 7. Although Windows 7 reached EoL on January 14, 2020. For those wishing to continue using Windows 7 after this date, Extended Security Updates (ESU) could be purchased including security updates for critical and important issues for a maximum of three years after January 14, 2020. This extended support ended on January 10, 2023.

Aside from the operating system security issues the browser must also be supported with regular updates. However, Chrome, Edge, Firefox, Opera and Vivaldi stopped providing updates and support, except that for Windows 7 and 8, Microsoft issued an out-of band security update for the final Windows 7 Edge version 109.0.1518.140 in September, 2023 and Firefox are providing security updates for the final Windows 7 version 115esr until September 2024. This means that, although still working, any improvements in later browser versions are not available. Current estimates show that there are still 50 million users of Windows 7 and there are some browsers that still support it, notably Yandex, a Russian browser and Supermium browser, both based on Chromium. We tested them and can report that they both perform better that the older unsupported browsers and Supermium even better than the current Chromium-based browsers. From the results of our testing we can make some comments about the choice of browsers.

For Windows 7 users, Firefox, although not updating beyond version 115, will continue to provide security updates until September 2024 and after installation should show esr (extended support release) after the version number. Yandex performs well, equalling Chrome and Edge in HTML 5 and exceeding them in CSS 3. However, we are not comfortable using this Russian browser, especially seeing how it imported data from other browsers without permission. Alternatively, Canadian developed Supremium, while presently only based on Chromium version 122, exceeded all other browsers including those based on the latest version 124 running on Windows 10. It is an interesting choice for Windows 7, but we were disappointed to find it laggy when running some animated images and it still has other issues, such as it cannot be set as the default browser. For those interested, it will even run on Windows XP and Vista.

For Windows 10 users, We would tend to use Edge on Windows, especially when interacting with Microsoft websites. For those who synchronise with Android devices, Chrome is good and Iron may reduce the tracking experienced by Chrome users. Because of some differences in how non-Chromium browsers handle code we usually also monitor websites using Firefox.

For recent Android versions, there seems to be few reasons to make it worth the effort to replace Chrome, which like Android is owned by Google, although other browsers such as Vivaldi or Iron might be added.

Browser Comparisons