Best browser 2014: which should you be using?

Back in the old days there was just one browser, and everyone was happy. Okay, maybe not happy, but it was certainly easier to decide which browser to run when the answer was always

Netscape.

Now, though, it's much more complicated - not least because the big browsers appear to be updated every fourteen minutes and boast more options than the world's most complicated Swiss Army Knife.


So which browser is best for you? Is it the same answer on Windows 8 as Windows XP? Should Mac owners stick with the Apple option or go Google? There's only one way to find out, and that's to put the big browsers head to head and see where they shine or struggle.



We're comparing moving targets, of course: for example, while Firefox 28 is pretty great the incoming Firefox 29, which introduces the new Australis interface, is already available as a beta. To keep our comparisons fair, though, we're sticking with the most recent final releases. On Windows that means Internet Explorer 11,


Firefox 30, Chrome 34, Opera 20 andSafari 7, all available on Windows 8.1.
Best browser for speed




Browsers don't generally feel sluggish any more, but there are still crucial differences in the way they do things, especially web apps. The venerable


Sun-spider benchmark is a good indication of how well a browser performs under pressure, and the lower the score the faster the browser. At the risk of sounding like an Upworthy headline here: we tested all the major browsers in Sunspider. Their scores may surprise you.

1. Safari 197.9ms 
2. Opera 174.4ms 
3. Chrome165.2ms 
4. Firefox 157.9ms 

Internet Explorer (desktop)94.7ms
Internet Explorer (modern)93.1ms