Standard compliance

Do these browsers even care? Should you?

There are a number of benchmark tests that you can subject web browsers to. The outcome can help you decide if a particular browser will aid you in your efforts to watching online streaming content or be totally useless for conferencing, for example. Bear in mind, however, that these tests aren’t a perfect substitute for test-driving the software yourself to find the best fit for your needs.

For this Roundup, we’ve subjected our selection of browsers to the Acid3 as well as the HTML5 tests. The latter is used to determine how well a browser supports HTML5, while the former tool tests the browser on a variety of parameters and then reports the findings.

All the browsers scored 97/100 on the Acid3 test. This is expected because most modern browsers fail to achieve the target score of 100. The test also reports the total time taken, and Brave was the slowest. However, the score itself, as well as the relative slow running of the tests in itself isn’t an indication of any problems with the browser.

Against the total score of 555, Brave only manages 521, which is the lowest of the five because all other browsers managed

526 while Opera managed 524. All the browsers struggled on account of their support – or rather their lack of support – certain audio and video codecs. For instance, none of the browsers support MP4 or H.265 out of the box, but Opera also doesn’t support H.264.

There are various other tests that you can use to assess browsers, depending on your use case. For instance, the JetStream test will reveal support for web applications, while MotionMark tests the support for graphics systems.

VERDICT BRAVE

FALKON

OPERA 4/5 4/5 4/5

SLIMJET VIVALDI

Suffice to say, all the browsers are fairly comparable. 4/5 4/5

4.5/5

The browser has some unique features, such as the free VPN as well as native extensions, which sets it apart from its peers. In this aspect, Opera is quite similar to Brave, which ships with support for the Tor network.

Opera’s USP is its sidebar, on the left of the window. In addition to integration with social media platforms such as Instagram and Whatsapp, it also provides quick access to My Flow. This tool enables you to effortlessly send messages and files to all your connected devices. Some of its features, such as organising tabs into different Workspaces requires some reading, which is why the sidebar also provides quick access to useful tutorials. Even better, the sidebar is customisable and makes it possible to select what elements you wish displayed. There are many extensions available for the sidebar, which help improve workflow.

VIVALDI