What’s the Best Web Browser? The browser you choose to surf the Internet can make a big difference in your overall satisfaction with your own online experience. But it’s not always clear which web browser you should actually use. The following pie chart shows the top browsers used by people coming to several of my websites during the last 30 days: Following are some thoughts on how to choose the best browser. No choice: It’s not surprising that Internet Explorer has the most usage by people in the insurance industry. Many insurance company websites and agency service vendors’ websites only work when using Internet Explorer. They are specifically designed and programmed to only support Internet Explorer. Reliability: There's nothing more frustrating than when your browser hangs up, forcing you to restart it or, taking more time, forcing you to reboot your computer. So it makes sense to go with a reliable browser. According to Sauce Labs, an Internet software testing company, the browser with the worst crash record over the past two years is Apple Safari. Internet Explorer is in the middle of the pack of the five major browsers. The best is Mozilla Firefox, followed by Google Chrome. However the crash, or error, rates are low. Safari has an error rate of just 0.12%. And, recent versions of all browsers are more stable than previous versions. Speed: While reliability is important, the speed of the browser is also important. How fast a web page will load varies between platforms. Speed has been Chrome's claim to fame from its first release. But the latest testing by PC Magazine shows the top three browsers are just about the same when it comes to speed. Latest Version: Whatever browser you choose to use, make sure you are using the latest version. The latest version will help you improve the security of your systems. You don't want to surf the Web with vulnerabilities that hackers and identity thieves can exploit.
Using Multiple Browsers: I have installed and use all three browsers depending on what I am doing. My marketing platform requires Firefox to use all of its functions. I find Chrome is best when using the various Google sites and services. I often have multiple browsers running at the same time. It's easy to use more than one browser. All four of the top browsers are free for personal use. There's no reason not to download each of them and test out which you like best. Following are the download sites for various products: • • • •
Internet Explorer Firefox Chrome Safari
Independent Insurance Agents of New Mexico - www.iianm.org - * January 2014
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