Windows software

The self-described ‘browser for power users’ hits version 1.

We first looked at Vivaldi a little over a year ago, when it was released in its first preview version. The devs are pitching the app as being for power users. Largely, that means lots of inbuilt tools and customisation options; the developers aren’t really interested in the minimalist direction. Vivaldi has an expanding toolbar on the left-hand side, with quick access to your bookmarks folders, downloads and a built-in text editor that lets you quickly take notes or save web text.

Customisation goes much deeper than that, though: you can have your tab bar at the top, bottom, left or right (opting for the sides will display open tabs as large thumbnails) and the dedicated search box has five preconfigured options built in (Google, Bing, Yahoo, DuckDuckGo and Wikipedia) with the ability to add as many more as you like. There are keyboard shortcuts and trackpad gestures, an integrated content blocker that did a reasonable job of blocking ads (although doesn’t appear to be customisable in any way — we couldn’t find anything about it in Vivaldi’s settings) and there’s even the ability to load a page without images, potentially great for saving bandwidth for when that matters. There’s also compatibility with most Chrome and Firefox extensions — that included our personal essentials, including the LastPass password manager and Pocket for saving stories.

It’s also fairly reasonably on system resources — about 10–15% more frugal than Chrome in our tests. In short, if you’re sick of the big-name browser options, there’s a lot here that should appeal. Definitely worth a try.