Tech
The browser wars aren’t about search anymore — here are the best alternatives to Chrome and Safari
The browser wars have entered a new phase this year: The fight isn’t just over search results anymore — it’s over which company’s AI gets to act on your behalf inside the browser. Google Chrome and Apple’s Safari still dominate the market overall, with Chrome’s edge coming largely from how aggressively it has woven generative AI into search. But 2026 has brought a wave of new entrants — from well-funded startups to Big Tech — all betting that the browser is about to become less like a window onto the web and more like an assistant that gets things done for you.
Users looking for alternatives to Chrome and Safari can choose from a growing variety of browsers aimed at challenging the industry giants. To help navigate the competitive landscape, we’ve compiled an overview of some of the top alternative browsers available today. This includes browsers leveraging AI, open source browsers that promote customization and privacy, and “mindful browsers” — a new term that refers to browsers designed to enhance user well-being.
AI-powered browsers
Perplexity’s Comet
Perplexity is the most recent startup in the space to launch an AI-powered web browser. Called Comet, the company’s new product acts as a chatbot-based search engine, and can perform actions like summarizing emails, browsing web pages, and performing tasks such as sending calendar invites. It’s currently only available to users with Perplexity’s $200/month Max plan, but there’s also a waitlist where people can sign up.
The Browser Company’s Dia
The Browser Company, the startup behind the Arc browser, recently introduced Dia, its AI-centric browser that looks similar to Google Chrome but with an AI chat tool.
Currently available as an invite-only beta, Dia is designed to help users navigate the web more easily. It’s able to look at every website that a user has visited and every website they’re logged into, enabling it to help you find information and perform tasks. For instance, Dia can provide information about the page a user is currently browsing, answer questions about a product, and summarize uploaded files.
To get early access to Dia, users have to be an Arc member. Non-members can join the waitlist.
Opera’s Neon
Another recent entry into the AI agentic browser war is Opera’s Neon, which has contextual awareness and can do things like researching, shopping, and writing snippets of code. Notably, it can even perform tasks while the user is offline.
Neon is currently available on macOS and Windows. The subscription costs $19.90 per month.
OpenAI’s Atlas
OpenAI recently launched its AI-powered web browser, called Atlas. The browser allows users to ask ChatGPT about search results and browse websites within the chatbot instead of being directed to outside links. There’s also an “agent mode” for users to ask ChatGPT to complete tasks on their behalf.
Atlas was first rumored to launch in July; however, it only became available on macOS in October. It’s expected to arrive on Windows, iOS, and Android devices soon.
Aside
Backed by Y Combinator, Aside is an upcoming AI-first, browser-native automation platform built to autonomously complete tasks, fill out forms, and manage data on behalf of users. The company describes the experience simply: “Give it your passwords, browsing history, and browser context.” Unlike traditional automation tools that rely on integrations, Aside operates directly within the browser itself, allowing it to work across Gmail, Notion, Slack, Figma, and banking platforms.
Users can sign up for the waitlist ahead of launch.
Jatter
Jatter launched its AI-powered browser in June, giving users the ability to ask questions about any web page, uncover relevant insights, and receive personalized recommendations based on their browsing activity. Additionally, Jatter offers an integrated Notes app, so it can learn from that content, summarize notes, and surface key details.
Jatter is currently available on Mac, Windows, iOS, and Android devices. It’s free to use, but there’s an optional subscription for $10 per month.
Privacy-focused browsers
Brave
Brave is among the more well-known privacy-first browsers, popular for its built-in ad and tracker blocking capabilities. It also has a gamified approach to browsing, rewarding users with its own cryptocurrency called Basic Attention Token (BAT). When users choose to opt in to view ads, supporting their favorite websites, they get a share of the ad revenue. Additional features include a VPN service, an AI assistant, and a video calling feature.
DuckDuckGo
DuckDuckGo is another browser that many people are probably already familiar with, thanks to its search engine by the same name. Launched in 2008, the company recently made significant investments in its browser to stay competitive by introducing generative AI features, such as a chatbot. It also enhanced its scam blocker to detect a wider range of scams, including fake cryptocurrency exchanges, scareware tactics, and fraudulent e-commerce websites. In addition to blocking scams, DuckDuckGo prevents trackers and ads, and it doesn’t track user data, resulting in fewer pop-ups for users.
Ladybird
Ladybird, led by GitHub co-founder and former CEO Chris Wanstrath, has an ambitious mission compared to other rivals: It aims to build an entirely new open source browser from scratch. This means it will not rely on code from existing browsers, a feat that has rarely been accomplished. Most alternative web browsers depend on the Chromium open source project maintained by Google, which is the most widely used base for many browsers.
Like other privacy-focused browsers, Ladybird will offer features to minimize data collection, such as a built-in ad blocker and the ability to block third-party cookies. The browser has yet to be launched, with an alpha version scheduled for release in 2026 for early adopters, available on Linux and macOS.
Vivaldi
Vivaldi is a Chromium-based browser created by one of the original developers of the Opera browser. Its biggest selling point is its customizable user interface, which allows users to change the appearance and enable or disable features. One unique feature is that the browser window changes color to match the website being viewed. Other key features include ad blocking, a password manager, no user data tracking, and productivity tools such as a calendar and notes.
Niche browsers
Opera Air
Opera launched the Air browser in February, becoming one of the first mindfulness-themed browsers in the space. While Opera Air functions like a typical web browser, it includes unique features designed to support mental well-being. These features consist of break reminders and breathing exercises. Another feature, called “Boosts,” provides a selection of binaural beats to either help improve focus or relaxation.
SigmaOS
SigmaOS is a Mac-only browser featuring a workspace-style interface that emphasizes productivity. It displays tabs vertically, allowing users to treat them like a to-do list that can be marked as complete or snoozed for later. Users can create workspaces — essentially groups of tabs — to better organize different activities, such as separating work from entertainment.
This Y Combinator-backed browser has been around for a few years now and has most recently begun introducing more AI features, including the ability to summarize various elements of a web page, such as ratings, reviews, and prices. It also has an AI assistant that can answer questions, translate text, and rewrite content.
SigmaOS is free to use, but users who want more than three workspaces can subscribe to a plan for $8 per month, which provides unlimited workspaces.
Zen Browser
Zen Browser aims to create a “calmer internet” with its open source browser. Zen lets users organize tabs into Workspaces, and offers Split View to view two tabs side by side, among other productivity-focused features. Users can also enhance their browsing experience with community-made plug-ins and themes, such as a mod that makes the tab background transparent.
This story has been updated after publication to include newly launched browsers.
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Tech
Alibaba reportedly bans employees from using Claude Code
China’s Alibaba will ban employees from using Anthropic’s programming tool Claude Code, starting on July 10, according to multiple reports.
Anthropic already prohibits Chinese companies, as well as foreign entities owned by those companies, from using its models. The company has reportedly been working to close loopholes that allow Chinese users to access Claude.
According to a recent Reddit post, some of that loophole-closing involved a version of Claude Code that could secretly identify Chinese users. Anthropic’s Thariq Shihipar said in a post on X that this was “an experiment we launched in March that was meant to prevent account abuse from unauthorized resellers and protect against distillation.” (Distillation is a practice where AI models are trained on the outputs of other models.)
“The team has landed stronger mitigations since then and we’ve actually been meaning to take this down for a while,” Shihipar said.
Nonetheless, Alibaba has reportedly classified Claude Code as high-risk software and is instructing employees to use the company’s own Qoder tool instead.
Tech
Midjourney wants Hollywood studios to reveal the details of their AI usage
As part of an ongoing legal dispute with three Hollywood studios, AI startup Midjourney is seeking to compel those studios to reveal how they use AI themselves.
Disney and Universal sued Midjourney for alleged copyright infringement last year, noting that the startup’s image-generation models could create images of characters, such as Bart Simpson and Darth Vader, who are owned by the studios. A few months later, Warner Bros. sued Midjourney as well.
The startup argues that training its AI models on images of copyrighted characters is permitted under fair use.
The current dispute revolves around the documentation the studios will need to produce during the discovery process. A judge previously ruled that the studios would indeed have to provide information about their generative AI usage – but only when it led to “consumer-facing” videos and images.
In its latest filing, Midjourney seeks to overturn that limitation, arguing that it “unfairly” allows the studios “to cherry-pick only those documents they believe support their market harm claims while depriving Midjourney of documents that would support its defenses.”
Midjourney goes on to claim that the “documents [the studios] are withholding are precisely those that would reveal whether, behind closed doors, they are doing exactly what they are suing Midjourney for doing.”
For example, the startup says that if the studios are developing image-generating AI models “for internal use in storyboarding or ideating content for film or TV, that evidence would equally demonstrate that it is an industry custom, even among the studios themselves, to download and train AI on unlicensed copyrighted content.”
In the filing, the startup also argues that the studios should reveal all the prompts they used in Midjourney, as well as the resulting outputs, not just the prompts that produced the allegedly infringing images.
The studios’ lead attorney David Singer previously claimed Midjourney was seeking this documentation as part of a “fishing expedition.”
He also said the studios “do not seek to stop AI technology or even shut down Midjourney’s business,” but rather “simply want Midjourney to stop copying their movies and TV shows and to stop distributing, publicly displaying, publicly performing, and creating derivative works that include copies of [their] famous characters without authorization.”
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Tech
New Google commercial imagines a Declaration of Independence written with help from AI
Two hundred and fifty years after the signing of the Declaration of Independence, a new commercial from Google asks: What if the Founding Fathers had access to Google Workspace?
With the tagline “Group project, but make it 1776,” the ad depicts a largely unseen Thomas Jefferson mid-draft when he gets a nagging text from Ben Franklin, leading to a very Google-centric collaboration process. Edits are suggested in Google Docs, a meeting gets scheduled in Google Calendar and conducted remotely via Google Meet (with every single attendee apparently turning their camera off?), then the whole thing is finalized with e-signatures; cue the fireworks.
Of course, since this is an ad from a tech company in the year 2026, AI has a role to play. The fictionalized founders use Google’s “help me visualize” AI tool to try out different animals on the national seal, Gemini takes notes on the meeting, and the founders also ask the chatbot for advice before declining King George III’s document access request.
The whole thing is very tongue-in-cheek (at one point, Sam Adams asks, “Can we settle this over beers?”), and the AI evangelism is relatively discreet when compared to many other recent ads. And unlike that infamous Google commercial in which a father uses Gemini to write a fan letter for his daughter, this one shies away from any suggestion that the actual text of the Declaration of Independence would be improved with AI. Perhaps the most AI-forward element of the ad is the footage itself, which to my eye has the uncanny glow of AI-generated video.
While viewer comments on YouTube and Instagram appear to be mostly positive, you may not be surprised to learn that the response on Bluesky has been far more critical. Posters declared the commercial “cringey” and “stunningly tone deaf,” and the AI angle was the biggest target — even as many users, including historian Angus Johnston, noted that it’s “amazing how little of this is actually AI.”
“Even in a corny fantasy joke, it’s impossible to make the case that AI is a useful tool for political organizing, writing, or human collaboration,” Johnston said.
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