What are some of the alternatives for Google Chrome and the Google search engine?
Google Chrome is one of the most popular browser out there and it is the go-to browser for most of us. But for some of the privacy concerned nerds out there, Google chrome is the last option they would consider for a web browser. Today, there are hundreds of browsers that are available free of cost. Some of the most popular ones are Firefox, Opera and Safari among others.
Why should you look for alternatives for Google Chrome?
As we all know, the Google Chrome web browser is owned by Google itself. This gives rise to many privacy concerns as Google is known for tracking and profiling the activities of each and every individual who uses the internet. Google chrome is also a target for a variety of cyber attacks and browser exploits, as it is one of the most popular tool to surf the internet.
Now that you have understood why it is important to shift from Google Chrome to another browser, you might be wondering what are some of the alternatives for Google chrome? Do they provide the same functionality and user experience as Chrome? The answer is… Yes. There are quite a few Chromium based browsers that are built using the Chromium Project (developed and open-sourced by Google) with enhanced privacy and security features. Some of the most popular Chromium based browsers are Brave, Comodo Dragon, Microsoft Edge and so on.
The best alternatives for Google Chrome :
In this article, we shall look at the two best and most popular alternatives for Google chrome. The first one is Brave Browser. Brave Browser is also an open-souced chromium based browser that has all the existing features of Google chrome and has enhanced security and privacy options. Brave is also considered as one of the best alternative for Google chrome as is recommend by some of the most famous organisations such as Wired and The Verge.
Similar to Google Chrome, Brave also has the same web store to download extensions and themes as it is based on the Chromium Project. The Brave browser also adds a ton of privacy related features out of the box, such as blocking web trackers and ads, integration with IPFS (a protocol designed to make the web faster and safer). This browser also includes the TOR that can be opened in a new tab. TOR can be used when you want to achieve maximum privacy by eliminating all the web trackers that track you. The brave browser is available on all major operating systems such as Windows, Linux, MacOS, Android and iOS. You can visit Brave’s official website to know more and download the application to your device by clicking here.
Another popular privacy focussed web browser that is built using the Chromium project is called the Comodo Dragon. This one is not as popular as Brave, but still is a great choice for the privacy concerned people that browse the internet. The Comodo browser is a little different compared to Brave. It has two versions : Comodo Dragon (based on Chromium Project) and Comodo IceDragon (based on Firefox).
The advantage of this browser over Brave is that it has its own secure DNS service. This means that all the website queries you make are sent to this secure DNS instead of your ISP or Google’s DNS. Similar to Brave, there are a ton of privacy enhancements added on the Comodo Dragon that makes the your browsing a lot more private and secure. Sadly, Comodo browser is available only for Windows at the time of writing this article. To know all the features of the Comodo Dragon browser, you can click here to visit the official website. If you are looking for more browsers, Techlog360 has summarised the Top 7 best chromium based browsers. You can check the article by clicking here.
The best alternatives for Google search engine :
The Google search engine is the most popular search engine used by millions of people worldwide. It is the go-to search engine for almost everyone that browses the internet. You might be wondering what is wrong with Google Search? As we have already seen in this article and previous articles, Google is known for collecting user data and using that for targeted advertisements. Some people don’t mind the advertisements appearing on their devices. But the privacy focussed people will need to eliminate everything and anything that are used to track their online activity.
There are many privacy based search engines on the internet and the most famous of them being DuckDuckGo. DuckDuckGo has a very strict privacy policy that do not track your searches and your online activity. But the downside to using this search engine is that the results you get are not as accurate as what you get with Google. The solution to get Google’s quality of results without bring tracked, is to use a search engine called Startpage. Startpage is one among the best alternatives for Google where you get Google-class results minus the tracking.
Startpage.com is a search engine that takes your search queries and gives you the results from Google, but blocking out all the trackers that are used to collect personal data. The search results are the same as what you get on Google. Startpage has a ton of privacy related features such as encrypted connections without revealing your IP Address. To test this out, if you type in the queries ” Where am I” or “Whats my IP”, the seacrh engine does not provide any results like what is seen in Google. This is because, all the trackers that determine your IP Address or location is being blocked by Startpage. In my opinion, startpage.com is the best way to use Google search without your personal data being sent to them.
Conclusion :
To summarise, the best alternatives for Google Chrome are Brave Browser/Comodo Dragon browser and the best alternatives for Google search engine is Startpage.com. Switching to Brave Browser or Comodo Dragon is hassle-free because you still get to use all the extensions and themes that you use with Google chrome. This is also one of the first steps to protect your online privacy. Using Startpage to search the internet is one of the safest way to Google things without being profiled or tracked.