Head to head: Alternatives to Safari on Mac
Firefox
FREE FROM Mozilla, mozilla.org NEEDS OS X 10.9 or later
Aesthetics
Firefox is simple and clean, with a plain white background. By default, the browser comes with just two themes – Light or Dark, but more can be downloaded. The interface is boxy and seems a little out of place on a Mac.
Privacy features
Firefox gives you the ability to fine-tune ad blocking, data collection and cookies preferences all from a single place. Its prominent presence in the Preferences pane is hard to miss. Firefox’s tracking protection is one of the best in the business, and it comes with auto deletion of cookies.
Other features
Firefox comes with cross-platform syncing for history, logins and bookmarks. The browser also supports Pocket natively, making it easier to access saved stories. Firefox also shows highlights from your history and bookmarks, identifying videos and pages that may be of interest. It’s a good way to see what’s happening with minimum effort.
Performance
Despite being built on Google’s Chromium base, Firefox takes up about 30% less memory than Google Chrome. However, it also performed more slowly than both Brave and Safari when using our suite of benchmarking tests.
Brave
FREE FROM Brave, brave.com NEEDS OS X 10.10 or later
Aesthetics
Brave takes a different approach to its design, with a beautiful background image and large clock greeting users on start up. The interface is also clean with gentle curves and colours that feel like a natural fit on a Mac.
Privacy features
Brave offers far more detailed settings to help protect your privacy online, with dedicated tabs for social media blocking, cross-site trackers and extensions. Plugins are disabled by default, and websites are automatically upgraded to HTTPS whenever possible.
Other features
Brave offers a rewards programme, where creators get paid for publishing ads that conform to Brave’s privacy policy. Users too get paid for viewing relevant ads, making it a win-win for the Brave community. Auto-sync across platforms is also available, with support for bookmarks, history and login data.
Performance
Like Firefox, Brave is built on Google’s Chromium base. It uses a around one-third less memory than Firefox and is up to three times faster on most websites – chiefly because it chooses to block many site ads and trackers by default.