Even if you switch all your tools to non-Google alternatives, it won’t matter much if you’re using them through Google Chrome.
Despite its notoriety for being a resource hog, it’s still the most popular browser with little competition to its market share.
Testing tools
For those who want a chart comparing the privacy of popular browsers, head on over to Privacy Test. If you want to roll up your sleeves and dig in, the EFF provides the aptly-named Cover Your Tracks. It gives you an overall rating and the option to go deeper to explore your browser’s fingerprint.
IP Leak is a simple tool for ensuring your VPN is doing its job and masking your IP address. Browser Leaks is for putting on your tinfoil-hat and exploring every clue your browser is exposing about you.
Browser Extensions
I’d be remiss not to mention extensions. This is the easiest way to take back your privacy without sacrificing what you’re used to. After all, privacy hardening can lead to issues while navigating the internet. Things like pages not loading or login not working.
The undisputed champ here is of course uBlock Origin that blocks trackers as well as ads. It does all that while being open-source too. The runners up Privacy Badger and IronVest focus solely on trackers instead.
IronVest is not open-source.
An honorable mention in this category would have to be AdNauseam. It takes the ad-blocking to a malicious degree by confusing them about your interests. It silently and automatically clicks on every ad you (don’t) see, to confuse them about your interests. The goal is to overwhelm trackers with such unreliable data that tracking becomes worthless.
An important question is where you can use these. Many think that extensions only exist for desktop browsers; likely because they use Chrome on their phones. In reality, Firefox Mobile has allowed you to use extensions on Android and iOS forever. If you’re Chrome loyalist, Kiwi is an open-source option that supports Chrome extensions.
iOS users who shudder at the thought of using Firefox might already know that Safari supports extensions as well.
Cross-platform
Firefox🐦🔥
Long live the fox! The Mozilla foundation has long been dedicated to internet privacy and security. They’ve launched and backed many privacy-friendly services–like the popular Thunderbird e-mail client.
As a browser, the public deemed Firefox second-best ever since Chrome burst onto the scene. Chrome only slightly edges it out in speed, but the difference is hardly noticeable or consistent. It wins in privacy, security, and resource usage. That said, Google has been allegedly slowing down their services on other browsers.
While Chrome has its web store from which you can add extensions, Firefox has an one too. Although you should make sure you only install extensions you trust. Speaking of trust, Firefox is open-source, which is awesome.
Brave
If you want an easy option to transition to, Brave is an excellent open-source choice. It shares its open-source Chromium skeleton with Chrome, so you should feel right at home. That means all your same browser extensions, history, and bookmarks are 100% compatible. No need to find Firefox equivalents to your favorite Chrome extensions.
It blocks ads and trackers by default, which is two less third-party extensions you need to trust. You also have the option of getting paid for watching “privacy-respecting ads”. You’d earn some of Brave’s own cryptocurrency: the Basic Attention Token (BAT). You can also donate your BAT to creators of your choice by tipping them.
On iOS devices , Brave also offers a firewall and VPN as premium features, to block ads and trackers in other apps too.
Update 2023:
I decided to remove Brave from my recommendations (and devices) due to the pattern of sketchy behavior from the company and its CEO. See this great write-up, another here and further discussion here.
Vivaldi
Just like Brave, Vivaldi is also based on Chromium, meaning it supports Chrome extensions. But you might not even need to.
Vivaldi takes a poweruser-centric approach. It prioritizes customization and features without compromising speed or performance. It offers ad and tracker blocking, built-in screenshot and note-taking tools. The interface is highly customizable to suit individual workflows, even allowing side-by-side tab-stacking.
Like Opera, Vivaldi includes a sidebar for chat apps and social feeds to keep them out of the way. It also features E2EE syncing of notes, bookmarks and passwords across your devices.
Waterfox
Waterfox advertises itself as a more private way to browse the internet, but it’s more than that. It takes a page out of Vivaldi’s book by sprinkling desirable customization options. Like many privacy-focused browsers, it allows you to choose between a “relaxed” mode and a “strict” mode, with the latter being more hardened. The sacrifice is that it might break the functionality of some websites.
For a Firefox-based browser, Waterfox mainly stands out for its smooth look and feel. They also claim to be faster than both Firefox and Chrome and, in my personal experience, it’s true. It is noticeably faster both to start and even to load pages than other web browsers.
My favorite feature is the sidebar tab switcher. It forgoes the traditional top bar approach for tab previews on the side. Though if you’re like me and never have less than 20 tabs open at a time, you won’t be able to make much use of it.
Update 2023:
Waterfox was acquired by System1, an advertising company that claims to protect privacy. They have since allegedly become independent again though.
Desktop
Thorium
If you’re not ready to leave Chromoium just yet, Thorium is a good transition. While not designed for privacy, it does a very good job deGoogling Chrome. Their focus is more on speed though, which is always welcome.
Cromite (Windows)
While Cromite doesn’t support Windows, there is a cool self-updating hack to make it work. Unlike Thorium, Cromite is in fact designed from the ground up to be as private as a Chromium fork can be. You can find more information on Cromite below in the Android section.
Mullvad
Mullvad is a hardened version of the Tor Browser that doesn’t use the Tor network. Instead, it’s designed to work in tandem with a VPN–after all, they are a VPN provider. It comes with the NoScript and uBlock Origin extensions built-in.
Underneath it all, it’s still using Firefox which you can add extensions to. Though it does lack some features like Firefox Sync and a password manager. The web also looks a bit strange when evading trackers to this extent. It’s hard to convey what I mean by this. Webpages are letterboxed to spoof your screen size. Even your timezone is offset, to mask what region you’re in.
LibreWolf
Unlike Mullvad, LibreWolf took a more sensible approach to hardening Firefox. They also stripped it from branded services, but didn’t go as far to combat fingerprinting. They aim to strike a better balance between usability and privacy. Depending on your needs and your workflow, you may find that balance suitable.
Floorp
Yo dawg, I heard you liked features, so I put features on top of features. Floorp is like Vivaldi on steroids, and Firefox-based. There’s way too much to get into here, but they don’t skimp on privacy either. It’s not the most private browser out there, but it’s more private than the most popular options.
Betterfox
While not really a browser, Betterfox is a script that speeds up your flavor of Firefox and enhances privacy. It’s also built-in to Floorp and all our honorable mentions: Pulse, Midori and Mercury.
Android
Chromium-based
Bromite
Bromite is my favorite privacy-friendly Chromium-based Android browser. It keeps useful features (e.g. translating pages and reading mode) while still making it lighter and more private
What makes Bromite stand out is the nifty additions it makes to Chromium. Like the dark mode that it enforces on websites. By manipulating their CSS, it make them dark even if they don’t natively support dark mode.
Another monumental benefit of Bromite is its SystemWebview. That’s the small mini-browser that Android uses to open webpages inside other apps. Regardless what browser you use, Google is using SystemWebview to spy on you every time you click a link in any app. Bromite fixes that by developing its own version of SystemWebview. Installing it is a bit tricky, but they provide a helpful script that guides you through the process.
Update 2023:
Bromite has been abandoned, but it’s being revived by Cromite.
Cromite
Bromite is dead! Long live Cromite! Cromite is Bromite’s life extension, being maintained by one of Bromite’s own developers. It’s being rebuilt slowly but in some ways it’s already better than Bromite.
Sadly, we still don’t have a Cromite SystemWebview yet though.
Firefox-based
If you’re trying to get away from Chromium, or if you want browser extensions on your phone, you should check out these options. They all take Firefox‘s open-source mobile browser and take different approaches to harden its privacy. The differences between them are very minor, so you can’t really go wrong with any of them.
In typical Apple fashion, Orion is the only non-open-source option on this list. I don’t use Apple devices so I’m unable to test it myself. For that reason alone I’d recommend using a Firefox- or Chromium-based option. In fact, I’d advocate against using Apple hardware all together but that’s a topic for another day.
Self-hosted
Neko
Neko is more than a browser. It’s actually a lot of things. Much like a VPN, it routes your internet traffic through a proxy server. But unlike a VPN, it actually lets you see the entire screen of that proxy server. This opens up a lot of possibilities, like virtual watch parties, which is their primary focus. Start playing a movie Linux distro and send the link to your watch party-mates so you can all watch it together. It enables interactivity through chat, file sharing, and even clipboard sharing. Pretty cool stuff.
Browsh (CLI)
Brow.sh is not the kind of browser you would want to use every day. Or ever, perhaps. It’s a browser that runs inside a commandline interface. SSH to be exact. There’s something unfathomably cool about browsing a text-only internet in the modern world. Sure it’s not very practical, but it sure is pretty, and pretty fast. And did I mention how cool it is?
The best part is that Browsh is completely self-hosted. If that sounds confusing for a browser, I’ll explain. You don’t actually have to use it through an SSH terminal, even though it lives there. You see, the browser doesn’t actually run from your device. It runs from your server. Your phone or computer simply sends every request to it, and it requests the websites you end up seeing. By the time they reach your screen, they’ve gone through plenty of processing to make all the modern elements of the internet work.
I’m talking images, video, JavaScript, it all works. Page sizes are shrunk tremendously, making them a lot faster to load.
And oh look, you’ve accidentally set up a proxy server. Using Browsh also hides your identity from the websites you’re visiting. To them, it’s your server making the requests, not you. I highly recommend giving this one a shot if you have your own server.