I’ve tried switching to Safari a few times, but I keep struggling with finding an ad-blocking extension that Just Works. Aside from that, I like it, but just a couple minutes on the ad-covered Web makes me need to go crawling back to Chrome. I set up uBlock Origin Lite years ago in Chrome and it’s functionally fully set-it-and-forget-it.
“Just use pi-hole” well sometimes I leave my house so that is an insufficient option.
I find this statement ironic while talking about the browser that spearheaded manifest v2 deprecation for "safety". Just use Firefox people, ublock origin still works there.
I would love to use Firefox exclusively on my Mac, but I also like a long lasting battery. Because of https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1941693 Firefox currently uses twice as much CPU during YouTube video playback than even Chrome when you have ProMotion (120 Hz) enabled, significantly reducing battery lifetime. Switching to a different browser every time I want to play a longer YouTube video also isn't the best user experience.
The one thing that keeps me from using Safari is web apps can't update their tab's favicon. That means if you load a site that uses the favicon for notifications you either (a) login when you have a notification and it will now forever seem like you have a notification or (b) login when you don't have a notification and it will forever seem like you don't have any notifications.
Yes, you can clear a cache sometime for a one time update, but that is hardly helpful.
For those needing uBlock Origin please give wBlock a try. It's also open source but uses native Safari content blocking APIs. It's faster and works and syncs with iPhones through iCloud.
My only complaint about Safari is I wish Apple would fully adopt PWA standards on iOS. I believe they don’t want to because it would make the App Store less necessary.
Apple has systematically ensured PWAs are second-class apps on iOS. They've done just about everything they can to hobble them, including restrictions on memory, storage, notifications, background updates, and which browser can use them (only Safari). It's clear to everyone that this is done to prevent app developers from distributing their software outside the App Store. That's their largest profit centre. Of course they're protecting it.
Partly, sure. Don’t think that’s the whole story. I don’t work at Apple or anything so I don’t know what actually goes on in board meetings but I think any tech person would see there are pros and cons to web apps versus native apps.
There’s a funny history where the original iPhone apps could only be web apps as there was no SDK! See history section at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IOS_SDK
I switched from Firefox on macos and ios about a year ago when things started to get a bit weird with Mozilla. Safari is a highly capable browser, light weight, great performance on both iphone and mac, and is just a really nice experience overall. If I could use it on linux and windows as well, I would.
I made the switch on mobile a while back and adjusted quickly. I really don’t miss chrome there. I did try to switch from Arc to Safari on my laptop and my experience was much less pleasant. There’s just a ton of clunky ux on safari. I’ll give it a try again but once I made the mistake of dismissing the permissions popup that appears for every video call and it just never came back (subsequent meetings). I’m sure it’s in my settings somewhere but this felt crazy. I’m required to click approve to use my camera on every video call but if I hit ‘esc’ once then I’ll never be reprompted? That makes no sense.
AFAIK on iOS all browsers are safari anyway. Apple doesn’t allow you to use anything but safari’s engine (WebKit) for browsers so chrome, Firefox, etc all run WebKit on that platform. Might as well use safari as it’s better integrated. And it supports uBlock origin (lite). With that and NextDNS, I have no ads anywhere. For the YouTube app, I use proton’s Albania vpn and no ads there either.
I find this page super interesting because it's what you'd expect from a B2B SaaS vendor, not from Apple. You'd never see them build an "iPhone vs Samsung" page, for instance.
I abandoned chrome for ff a few yrs ago when the privacy issues became impossible to ignore. I abandoned ff for safari about a year ago when performance problems became unbearable. My biggest annoyance was the lack of devtools until a single web search revealed that safari does in fact have a full featured set of devtools, you just need to turn them on. No complaints.
Reader mode and hide distracting items are phenomenal, use them both daily.
I will switch to Safari immediately once they expand the number of languages supported by auto-translate. The current selection is very limited, and almost clownish for 2026.
I've used Safari since I switched to Mac in 2009. It's always been fast and smooth, and the integration - like password sync and SMS 2FA keys - works great.
I can't count on two hands the amount of times I 'solved' technical issues for friends and family by having them do a certain process (like a booking) on chrome instead of safari.
Everyone should avoid Google Chrome, and as such this campaign is welcome. But my major gripe with Safari is:
1. It is not multi-platform. A browser that isn't available for Windows, Linux, xBSD is not a browser I would use or recommend to others.
2. I don't want "Intelligent Tracking Prevention" or some limited Apple curated lists of content blockers - uBlock Origin should be fully functional in it.
3. No requirement of an "App Store" to install browser extensions.
4. No built-in AI bullshit. Rather make certain browser APIs open so that any other AI tools can use and manipulate it as the user wants.
5. Fully open source (in Safari, only Webkit is open source).
The headline is so funny. "please please please please, I beg you stay on safari, I swear we better than chrome please please please we really want your data"
Proud Firefox user. Will suffer with it until my grave. This little fox has been giving me the beach ball on Mac ever since last year MacOS update, but I just Ctrl+Alt+Del and start it again....
“Just use pi-hole” well sometimes I leave my house so that is an insufficient option.
It’s stupid, I know. But sometimes people like cars with a different colour of paint. Chrome has had this since maybe 2009?
https://github.com/0xCUB3/wBlock
https://skula.me/project/wblock/
Thanks, but I've already upgraded to Firefox.
Yes, you can clear a cache sometime for a one time update, but that is hardly helpful.
also annoying when working locally as the favicon persists amongst different projects using the same port on localhost.
There’s a funny history where the original iPhone apps could only be web apps as there was no SDK! See history section at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IOS_SDK
https://infrequently.org/series/browser-choice-must-matter/
Now on desktop, use Firefox and uBlock origin.
adjective
ˈstrānj
stranger; strangest
a : different from what is usual, ordinary, or expected : odd
And many years ago they had a huge Mac vs Windows campaign! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Get_a_Mac
CTRL+F on the page shows that "Android" is only written once (!) and there is no logo or anything. It's as generic and indirect as it can be.
>And many years ago they had a huge Mac vs Windows campaign!
Exactly, many years ago, and then they stopped, which makes this unusual by definition
it's the same as their switch from Windows to Mac advertisement from the early 2000s
Although I do not know if they have done anything like this since that until today
You’d be surprised! https://www.apple.com/iphone/switch/
Reader mode and hide distracting items are phenomenal, use them both daily.
And to iPhone: https://www.apple.com/iphone/switch/
I can't count on two hands the amount of times I 'solved' technical issues for friends and family by having them do a certain process (like a booking) on chrome instead of safari.
1. It is not multi-platform. A browser that isn't available for Windows, Linux, xBSD is not a browser I would use or recommend to others.
2. I don't want "Intelligent Tracking Prevention" or some limited Apple curated lists of content blockers - uBlock Origin should be fully functional in it.
3. No requirement of an "App Store" to install browser extensions.
4. No built-in AI bullshit. Rather make certain browser APIs open so that any other AI tools can use and manipulate it as the user wants.
5. Fully open source (in Safari, only Webkit is open source).
> we really want your data
this is a projection