A Comparison of Web Browsers

In 1991, the 'creator' of the World Wide Web, Tim Berners-Lee, coded the web browser WorldWideWeb, a compilation of existing technologies used for company intranets (like an internet just within a particular company). WorldWideWeb was text-only, so usage of the WWW was limited.

Web browsers that could support images came in 1993 in the form of NCSA Mosaic, increasing internet usage sharply worldwide. The leader of the Mosaic development team, Marc Andreessen, started Netscape shortly after, and Netscape Navigator was born in 1994. It might surprise some readers that in April 1996 Navigator users made up almost 90% of those online worldwide.

In 1995 Microsoft launched its rival browser Internet Explorer. To market Internet Explorer, Microsoft made it a part of Windows, so that most computer users would be forced into using Microsoft's own browser. In the final quarter of 1998 Internet Explorer usage began to eclipse Netscape Navigator, with a slim majority of just over 50% using Microsoft's browsr.

Although the web browser Opera entered the market in 1996, it has less than 1% of the browser share as of 2009. However, it did reach success on the mobile phone browser market - it is preinstalled in over 40 million phones.

Mozilla Firefox was officially released in 2004, although it did have widespread following during the beta stage of development. Currently, it is the most serious Internet Explorer competitor, holding over 20% of the market. Apple launched its web browser Safari in 2003 and currently has an 8% market share. More recently, Google Chrome was released, but partly due to privacy concerns with the browser it only holds 1.15% of the worldwide market share.

Internet Explorer is Microsoft's browser offering and comes preinstalled on every edition of the Windows operating system. It is by far the most dominant web browser with a massive 66.1% market share, compared to Mozilla Firefox's 22.48%. Here is a summary of the pros and cons of Internet Explorer as a web browser:

Pros

• Since Internet Explorer holds a large percentage of the marketshare, most web sites are optimised for it and you will find that you can access just about any site with it.

• The more recent Internet Explorer editions (IE7 and IE8) have a very sleek and futuristic look.

Cons

• Internet Explorer does not load web sites as fast as the other browsers can. I think it sacrifices speed for looks.

• It is not very customisable - on other browsers you can really make the interface 'yours' by adding webmail alerts, etc.

• The buttons are in very odd places, and they change from edition to edition. One day the refresh button's on the left, the next it's on the right!

Verdict: You can do much better than Internet Explorer in my opinion. If not for the customisation, at least change for the speed.

Mozilla Firefox was originally an offshoot of Netscape. Mozilla Firefox is open-source, meaning that you can edit and add to it to your heart's desire, if you know how.

Pros

• It is very customisable: using the addons website you can even change Firefox's look to Internet Explorer's if you want Firefox's speed and IE's look and feel.

• On average it loads a lot faster than Internet Explorer. You can also tweak it to run even faster... it's really quite amazing.

• It's very secure. It also has a really good pop-up blocker!

Cons

• Some web sites will not work with Mozilla Firefox. As Firefox gains a higher market share, this is becoming less of a problem, but it's always good to keep Internet Explorer installed just in case.

Verdict: I really like Firefox and use it all the time. To solve the compatibility issues I use the add-on called 'IE Tab' (search the link I gave above to find this).

If you're on a Mac, you're probably viewing this web page through the Safari browser, which holds the dominant market share in the Mac area.

Pros

• It's very compatible with all types of Macs and I would recommend it if you have a Mac.
• It is constantly updated by Apple.

Cons

• Many releases are not secure at all, and as such the updates can get a little too frequent to not be annoying!
• It's certainly not as customisable as Firefox or Opera.

Verdict: Use it if you have a Mac, but try other browsers if you're a Windows fan.

Google Chrome was only released recently, and it's extremely sleek and futuristic. Google certainly followed the minimalistic design style when coding Chrome, and as such I wouldn't expect much in customisability.

Pros

• Chrome has a wonderfully sleek and stylish design. Those who appreciate aesthetics will love Chrome.
• Chrome is reportedly faster than Firefox. This is a big plus for me.

Cons

• I have heard that Chrome is not so good for privacy; apparently your browsing histories are sent to Google for analysis.
• Apparently Google Chrome was built on a buggy version of something called 'WebKit', which opens the browser up to all kinds of terrible vulnerabilities!

Verdict: If you're big on security and privacy, Chrome is not for you, but if you just want the features Chrome has to offer on the surface, there's no harm in checking it out.