Battle Firefox vs. Brave vs. Vivaldi

Which browser—Firefox, Brave, or Vivaldi—is your favorite?

  • Firefox

    Votes: 42 46.7%
  • Brave

    Votes: 37 41.1%
  • Vivaldi

    Votes: 11 12.2%

  • Total voters
    90
Compare list
Firefox vs. Brave vs. Vivaldi
Platform(s)
  1. Any platform
I don't trust Brave. The past incidents left scars. In the same way, DDG was caught allowing Microsoft trackers. Firefox, too, was sending (pinging) what you default browser is to Mozilla.
I trust none; Brave is just fast, resources-friendly, stable, and has a nice adblocker.
But all will sell you for an extra penny.
 
I trust none; Brave is just fast, resources-friendly, stable, and has a nice adblocker.
But all will sell you for an extra penny.
Privacy is a dream. In this era one can never obtain it. Some of my friends brag about using open source software and Linux instead of Windows and they forgot that they are running open source software on a closed source hardware.

My main browser is Vivaldi and it is less evil. My secondary browser is Waterfox now and it is good to some extent. Edge is no longer a browser and it is too bloated. Chrome is my enemy.

I hope Helium keeps improving. And I hope it never loses its way.
 
Privacy is a dream. In this era one can never obtain it. Some of my friends brag about using open source software and Linux instead of Windows and they forgot that they are running open source software on a closed source hardware.

My main browser is Vivaldi and it is less evil. My secondary browser is Waterfox now and it is good to some extent. Edge is no longer a browser and it is too bloated. Chrome is my enemy.

I hope Helium keeps improving. And I hope it never loses its way.
Does Brave Shields work well on the Waterfox browser? Are there any compatibility issues?
 
Brave with adblocker at standard and no extensions Screenshot 2026-07-06 030344.jpgScreenshot 2026-07-06 030608.jpg vs Edge with no extensions
 
I confirm that Waterfox does ship with Brave Shields, but not as an extension. Adblock-rust is compiled directly into Waterfox's main process loop.

As for licensing, Brave is distributed under MPL-2.0. Since Waterfox is a Firefox fork, this aligns perfectly with Brave licensing.
 
I confirm that Waterfox does ship with Brave Shields, but not as an extension. Adblock-rust is compiled directly into Waterfox's main process loop.

As for licensing, Brave is distributed under MPL-2.0. Since Waterfox is a Firefox fork, this aligns perfectly with Brave licensing.
But there is a catch! By default Waterfox adblocker does allow non-tracking, text-based ads to display on Waterfox default search engine (1.org)

Edit.

1.org is also owned by System1. System1 acquired Waterfox, but Waterfox went independent again under BrowserWorks.
 
@Parkinsond
How has your experience with Zen Browser been so far?
I have used it for 3 days. Insane memory and could consumption. I hated that it starts with Windows by default. I do not see any reason to use it. It is still not mature and I'd persoanlly use Vivaldi over it.

If one wants Firefox, then it is either Waterfox or Floorp for now.
 
I just discovered that the search field in the Vivaldi browser has the same Firefox feature that lets you temporarily change the search engine by clicking on the search engine icon instead of remembering shortcuts. This is one of my favorite Firefox features. Well done, Vivaldi.

View attachment 298654
I don't know if it's possible in Brave, but in Firefox you type @g -> press Enter and it searches Google. You type @b -> press Enter and it starts searching Bing. I love that!
 
I don't know if it's possible in Brave, but in Firefox you type @g -> press Enter and it searches Google. You type @b -> press Enter and it starts searching Bing. I love that!
I believe it is also available in Chromiim-based browsers too. You go to search engines settings and assign shortcuts there. I have not personally tried it as I just use DDG.

Vivaldi uses nicknames to search engines
And brave assigns shortcuts and so on.
 
I don't know if it's possible in Brave, but in Firefox you type @g -> press Enter and it searches Google. You type @b -> press Enter and it starts searching Bing. I love that!
I believe it is also available in Chromiim-based browsers too. You go to search engines settings and assign shortcuts there. I have not personally tried it as I just use DDG.

Vivaldi uses nicknames to search engines
And brave assigns shortcuts and so on.
Yes, all browsers have shortcuts assigned to change the search engine for a one-time search. However, I am referring to the fact that in Firefox and Vivaldi, you can click the search engine icon to reveal a dropdown menu listing all predefined search engines in your browser settings. This makes switching between them much more convenient. Perhaps my screenshot was unclear because it was small, but here is what I mean:

2026-07-07 17_31_03-.png2026-07-07 17_32_07-Greenshot.png
 
Reduced to 8.9 %.;)

P.S.

Having too many extensions enabled slows down your browser.
Now I only have 2 extensions that are always enabled.

Yep, you're right :) I was having a little chat with Google of the slower web page loading with FF compared to Brave. Mind you, it's not that drastic, but is noticeable.
I mentioned my extensions, and Google pointed out that Dark Reader takes up a lot of resources. So, I ran Speedmeter 3.1 with these results.

With Brave and my extensions being, Proton Pass, F-Secure browser extension, Zoom, and Dark Reader with Brave Shield set to aggressively block trackers and ads.
With Dark Reader enabled, my result was 13.5. With Dark Reader disabled in Extensions, the result was 23.3

With Firefox and my extensions being the same as with Brave, but also using uBlock Origin (i.e. no "Brave Shield").
With Dark Reader enabled, the result was 9.93, with Dark Reader disabled in Extensions, was 19.4

I do realize with Brave I can go into Brave Flags and enable dark mode, but on this site it wipes out the upper right corner icons (they're there when I hover my mouse over that area) and some members Avatars look like a film negative, so I disabled it.

I'm sure most of you all knew that about Dark Reader, but just in case, I thought I'd mention it :)
 
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I do realize with Brave I can go into Brave Flags and enable dark mode, but on this site it wipes out the upper right corner icons (they're there when I hover my mouse over that area) and some members Avatars look like a film negative, so I disabled it.
Opera and Yandex have side-bar toggle or context menu entry to turn off dark mode flag on specific sites, but on the expense of lots of cons.
Zen introduced a toggle (but of native dark mode, not as good as chromium flag), but again with price of slower enginge and bugs.
 
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Yep, you're right :) I was having a little chat with Google of the slower web page loading with FF compared to Brave. Mind you, it's not that drastic, but is noticeable.
After a break from Firefox for about 1–2 months, I came back recently with release 153. I didn’t notice any real speed difference compared to other Chromium-based browsers, and the issues I’d been having with Reddit and GitHub seem to have disappeared. YouTube also starts immediately now, though I don’t know what changed. It probably isn’t noticeable to most users, unlike what Speedometer 3.1 shows. I’m using uBlock Origin and Dark Reader, and I also added “Adaptive Tab Bar Color” which works with Dark Reader. Maybe that extension caused the improvement! 🤔
 
unlike what Speedometer 3.1 shows
Its results are variable.
Before reinstall days ago, Edge scored latst after Yandex on top, followed by Chrome and Brave using uBOL for all, except for Shields only for Brave.
After reinstall, Edge scored higher with a margin compared to Brave, without extensions or shields on both.
 
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After a break from Firefox for about 1–2 months, I came back recently with release 153. I didn’t notice any real speed difference compared to other Chromium-based browsers, and the issues I’d been having with Reddit and GitHub seem to have disappeared. YouTube also starts immediately now, though I don’t know what changed. It probably isn’t noticeable to most users, unlike what Speedometer 3.1 shows. I’m using uBlock Origin and Dark Reader, and I also added “Adaptive Tab Bar Color” which works with Dark Reader. Maybe that extension caused the improvement! 🤔

And I'm revisiting FF with it's easy to use and matured Containers (compared to Brave). That's why I talked with Google (as well as the slower FF browsing speed, at least for me), as within about the last week, I've been getting a lot of Google captcha prompts in Brave. It only works without the prompts in a Private window. With VPN off, Brave Shields disabled, clearing out Permissions/All sites, I still would get the captchas. With Chrome, no problems, with FF no problems, no captcha's

This morning in Brave it was fine, then about an hour ago, here we go again with the Google prompts, so I switched back to FF. And with using the Dark Background and Light Text extension, it's been great replacement for Dark Reader in FF, and doesn't slow the browsing down like Dark Reader did. It's now where I was at with Brave. The only issue now is with this forum software, if I use a emoticon in a reply I can't get the cursor to the right of it to continue typing...I'm just going to have to leave them for the end of a post.
 
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This morning in Brave it was fine, then about an hour ago, here we go again with the Google prompts
I had to disable Brave shields premanently for Google search to avoid the prompts.
Of course sponsored results came back, but I can deal with.
The only issue now is with this forum software, if I use a emoticon in a reply I can't get the cursor to the right of it to continue typing
I had a similar problem with its fork, Zen.
 
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