{"slug": "chromium", "name": "Chromium", "category": "browsers", "category_name": "Browsers and extensions", "description": "Open-source web browser project that serves as the codebase for Google Chrome.", "recommenders": 6, "commenters": 19, "warners": 4, "score": 4.055, "rising": -0.64, "first": "2025-11-25", "latest": "2026-10-18", "why": "HN commenters like Chromium for its speed, especially on heavy or canvas-based pages, and as a fallback for sites that break in Firefox.", "why_is_quote": false, "has_verdict": true, "sentiment": {"recommend": 6, "neutral": 8, "compare": 1, "warn": 4}, "spark": [1, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 4, 0, 0, 1, 0], "listed": true, "loved": ["Site compatibility", "Speed"], "caveat": "Bloated codebase", "short_quote": "Chromium is significantly faster (maybe 5 to 10x faster on certain tasks mostly around canvas", "icon": true, "domain": null, "github_repo": null, "official_url": "https://www.chromium.org/", "pricing": "open source", "aliases": ["Chromium"], "verdict": [{"text": "HN commenters like Chromium for its speed, especially on heavy or canvas-based pages,", "cites": [{"id": 775566064, "item_id": 48472879, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48472879", "by": "dvh", "date": "2026-06-10", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Chromium is significantly faster (maybe 5 to 10x faster on certain tasks mostly around canvas", "excerpt": "There are 2 reasons why I'm using chromium (with ublock origin lite) over Firefox: 1. Chromium is significantly faster (maybe 5 to 10x faster on certain tasks mostly around canvas but anything that requires fast ui really). Every time I use Firefox it feels like it has some kind of serious problem. If chrome was this slow I would stop working and start investigating what part of my computer is broken. This experience", "context": "web developer", "use_case": "web development", "switched_from": "Firefox", "story": "Google Chrome is killing all uBlock Origin bypasses, Edge, Opera to follow"}, {"id": 736812944, "item_id": 46050809, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46050809", "by": "NaomiLehman", "date": "2025-11-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I switched from Firefox to Chromium because of speed.", "excerpt": "I switched from Firefox to Chromium because of speed.", "context": "", "use_case": "web browsing", "switched_from": "Firefox", "story": "Orion 1.0"}, {"id": 777819969, "item_id": 48613748, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48613748", "by": "SoKamil", "date": "2026-06-20", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Chromium is snappier in comparison, has no scrolling or hitbox glitches, does not crash on heavier websites.", "excerpt": "I'm an iOS user, but each time I use Android, I envy them their browser. Safari is just so sluggish - Chromium is snappier in comparison, has no scrolling or hitbox glitches, does not crash on heavier websites. I'm proponent of the open web so I hope this will encourage iOS's Safari to compete.", "context": "iOS user", "use_case": "mobile browsing on Android", "switched_from": "", "story": "28% Faster: Blink Prototype That Shows Why Apple iOS Browser Engine Ban Must End"}]}, {"text": " and as a fallback for sites that break in Firefox.", "cites": [{"id": 792527249, "item_id": 49532953, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49532953", "by": "fooker", "date": "2026-09-02", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "If I always have to have Chromium installed as a fallback, might as well use it.", "excerpt": "The usual culprits are government, bank, or google websites. Youtube and Google docs occasionally break in amusing ways. Definitely Google's fault to a large extent, but it is what it is. A friend recently got into making JS games, the FPS is always unplayable on Firefox. I'm not going to be snotty and ask someone doing this for fun to test stuff on multiple browsers. SVG rendering occasionally slows down to a crawl.", "context": "", "use_case": "fallback browser", "switched_from": "", "story": "Hang on to Your Firefox"}, {"id": 802293616, "item_id": 50143351, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50143351", "by": "monneyboi", "date": "2026-10-18", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I now have to `pacman -S chromium` to buy tickets from Deutche Bahn", "excerpt": "If only it would be possible to \"close your doors to AI agents\". It's not I'm afraid. Where do you draw the line? What browser is allowed? For example, I now have to `pacman -S chromium` to buy tickets from Deutche Bahn. They accuse me of being a bot when I use firefox on linux. It's a known problem, and I think stuff like this will only get worse the longer this cat and mouse goes on.", "context": "Linux user", "use_case": "buying train tickets", "switched_from": "Firefox", "story": "Websites are closing their doors to AI agents"}, {"id": 793648048, "item_id": 49603003, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49603003", "by": "aftbit", "date": "2026-09-07", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "It just starts a clean Chromium with a throw-away profile", "excerpt": "I have a handy little script called `chrome-new` which I use whenever I want to browse one of those few sites that struggles with Firefox. It just starts a clean Chromium with a throw-away profile, then deletes it when I close the browser. #!/bin/sh TMPDIR=$(mktemp -d /dev/shm/chrome-XXXXX) chromium --user-data-dir=$TMPDIR --no-first-run --no-default-browser-check --disable-features=DefaultBrowserPrompt \"$@\" rm -rf $", "context": "", "use_case": "browsing sites that break in Firefox", "switched_from": "", "story": "My practical approach to surfing the web safely"}, {"id": 778311025, "item_id": 48644439, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48644439", "by": "CobaltFire", "date": "2026-06-23", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Chromium if I have to for something.", "excerpt": "Safari for most things, Chromium if I have to for something. I didn't toss those there because those (and IDEs and SSH/Terminal clients) are very opinionated and everyone has their favorites.", "context": "", "use_case": "fallback browser", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: New clean macOS install. Must-have apps? Best browser?"}]}, {"text": " The most common complaint is a bloated codebase,", "cites": [{"id": 786254912, "item_id": 49140932, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49140932", "by": "rustfreeforme", "date": "2026-08-01", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Chromium, as a result, is a giant, bloated, buggy heap of shit, THAT CANNOT be properly maintained IN ANY LANGUAGE, due to the extreme level of bloat.", "excerpt": "> if I were to make a guess This is your problem. You keep guessing, and guessing, and guessing, constantly missing the mark. You just really, really, really want to be right, but you just really, really, really aren't. > But to spin this the other way around: in lieu of the Bun case, why not use it to rewrite the project in Rust, Zig, D or any language of your choice (yes, even C)? Because as I just explained to you", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Google fixed more Chrome bugs in June than over the past two years, thanks to AI"}, {"id": 786220736, "item_id": 49138796, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49138796", "by": "rustfreeforme", "date": "2026-08-01", "stance": "warn", "quote": "the Chromium source, which is a gigantic flaming heap of trash", "excerpt": "> The problem is that you think Rust programmers despise C or C++. No, I just checked, and there is no problem detected here. It does not matter if you despise C/C++ or not. The fact of the matter is--and it's very simple: YOUR ENTIRE WORLD IS BUILT ON C/C++. EVERYTHING YOU BUILD ON RUST IS THEREFORE BUILT ON THAT FOUNDATION. YOU ARE 100% DEPENDENT ON C++ AND--SHOCK, HORROR--C. FACT. Saying Rust is the replacement fo", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Google fixed more Chrome bugs in June than over the past two years, thanks to AI"}]}, {"text": " with others citing high RAM use and limited extension and ad-blocking support.", "cites": [{"id": 801899425, "item_id": 50118714, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50118714", "by": "rmunn", "date": "2026-10-16", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Chromium seem to just gobble up RAM", "excerpt": "> Upstream is just giving them software for free on an as-is basis. While the \"we're entitled to bugfixes\" attitude is definitely annoying for software maintainers to deal with, and you (as the end user) aren't entitled to anything from 99% of open-source projects... this is Chromium we're talking about. The browser engine that powers 75-95% of all Web browsing (it's very hard to pin down actual numbers, but it's hug", "context": "", "use_case": "web browsing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Comparing Chromium Development at Google and Igalia"}, {"id": 775025441, "item_id": 48439090, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48439090", "by": "satvikpendem", "date": "2026-06-07", "stance": "warn", "quote": "not using any Chromium browsers, especially due to not having full extension and adblocking support", "excerpt": "> is Chromium-based Yeah I'm out, not using any Chromium browsers, especially due to not having full extension and adblocking support. I'm not sure when you used Firefox but I don't find it slow at all, seems to be on par with Chrome and Safari.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Tell HN: Helium is the best browser I ever used"}]}], "praise": [{"label": "Site compatibility", "summary": "Commenters keep it installed for sites that break or run slowly in Firefox.", "quotes": [{"id": 792527249, "item_id": 49532953, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49532953", "by": "fooker", "date": "2026-09-02", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "If I always have to have Chromium installed as a fallback, might as well use it.", "excerpt": "The usual culprits are government, bank, or google websites. Youtube and Google docs occasionally break in amusing ways. Definitely Google's fault to a large extent, but it is what it is. A friend recently got into making JS games, the FPS is always unplayable on Firefox. I'm not going to be snotty and ask someone doing this for fun to test stuff on multiple browsers. SVG rendering occasionally slows down to a crawl.", "context": "", "use_case": "fallback browser", "switched_from": "", "story": "Hang on to Your Firefox"}, {"id": 802293616, "item_id": 50143351, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50143351", "by": "monneyboi", "date": "2026-10-18", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I now have to `pacman -S chromium` to buy tickets from Deutche Bahn", "excerpt": "If only it would be possible to \"close your doors to AI agents\". It's not I'm afraid. Where do you draw the line? What browser is allowed? For example, I now have to `pacman -S chromium` to buy tickets from Deutche Bahn. They accuse me of being a bot when I use firefox on linux. It's a known problem, and I think stuff like this will only get worse the longer this cat and mouse goes on.", "context": "Linux user", "use_case": "buying train tickets", "switched_from": "Firefox", "story": "Websites are closing their doors to AI agents"}, {"id": 793648048, "item_id": 49603003, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49603003", "by": "aftbit", "date": "2026-09-07", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "It just starts a clean Chromium with a throw-away profile", "excerpt": "I have a handy little script called `chrome-new` which I use whenever I want to browse one of those few sites that struggles with Firefox. It just starts a clean Chromium with a throw-away profile, then deletes it when I close the browser. #!/bin/sh TMPDIR=$(mktemp -d /dev/shm/chrome-XXXXX) chromium --user-data-dir=$TMPDIR --no-first-run --no-default-browser-check --disable-features=DefaultBrowserPrompt \"$@\" rm -rf $", "context": "", "use_case": "browsing sites that break in Firefox", "switched_from": "", "story": "My practical approach to surfing the web safely"}]}, {"label": "Speed", "summary": "Users find it noticeably faster than Firefox and Safari, especially for canvas and UI-heavy work.", "quotes": [{"id": 775566064, "item_id": 48472879, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48472879", "by": "dvh", "date": "2026-06-10", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Chromium is significantly faster (maybe 5 to 10x faster on certain tasks mostly around canvas", "excerpt": "There are 2 reasons why I'm using chromium (with ublock origin lite) over Firefox: 1. Chromium is significantly faster (maybe 5 to 10x faster on certain tasks mostly around canvas but anything that requires fast ui really). Every time I use Firefox it feels like it has some kind of serious problem. If chrome was this slow I would stop working and start investigating what part of my computer is broken. This experience", "context": "web developer", "use_case": "web development", "switched_from": "Firefox", "story": "Google Chrome is killing all uBlock Origin bypasses, Edge, Opera to follow"}, {"id": 736812944, "item_id": 46050809, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46050809", "by": "NaomiLehman", "date": "2025-11-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I switched from Firefox to Chromium because of speed.", "excerpt": "I switched from Firefox to Chromium because of speed.", "context": "", "use_case": "web browsing", "switched_from": "Firefox", "story": "Orion 1.0"}, {"id": 777819969, "item_id": 48613748, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48613748", "by": "SoKamil", "date": "2026-06-20", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Chromium is snappier in comparison, has no scrolling or hitbox glitches, does not crash on heavier websites.", "excerpt": "I'm an iOS user, but each time I use Android, I envy them their browser. Safari is just so sluggish - Chromium is snappier in comparison, has no scrolling or hitbox glitches, does not crash on heavier websites. I'm proponent of the open web so I hope this will encourage iOS's Safari to compete.", "context": "iOS user", "use_case": "mobile browsing on Android", "switched_from": "", "story": "28% Faster: Blink Prototype That Shows Why Apple iOS Browser Engine Ban Must End"}]}, {"label": "Stability", "summary": "Users report it rarely crashes, even on heavier websites.", "quotes": [{"id": 795353441, "item_id": 49709590, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49709590", "by": "IlikeMadison", "date": "2026-09-15", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "my firefox and chromium running as snaps never crashed a single time for as long as I can remember", "excerpt": "sandboxing a browser makes total sense. my firefox and chromium running as snaps never crashed a single time for as long as I can remember, and I use both every day, at the same time.", "context": "", "use_case": "daily browsing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ubuntu 26.10 completes transition to Rust-based coreutils"}, {"id": 777819969, "item_id": 48613748, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48613748", "by": "SoKamil", "date": "2026-06-20", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Chromium is snappier in comparison, has no scrolling or hitbox glitches, does not crash on heavier websites.", "excerpt": "I'm an iOS user, but each time I use Android, I envy them their browser. Safari is just so sluggish - Chromium is snappier in comparison, has no scrolling or hitbox glitches, does not crash on heavier websites. I'm proponent of the open web so I hope this will encourage iOS's Safari to compete.", "context": "iOS user", "use_case": "mobile browsing on Android", "switched_from": "", "story": "28% Faster: Blink Prototype That Shows Why Apple iOS Browser Engine Ban Must End"}, {"id": 776246625, "item_id": 48515414, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48515414", "by": "CamouflagedKiwi", "date": "2026-06-13", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Chromium feels like a solid product.", "excerpt": "Yeah, definitely agree with this. I still use Firefox a bit on some machines but it is constantly popping up little things - \"are you finding tabs overwhelming? try tab groups\" / \"try vertical tabs\" / whatever. I'm not finding them overwhelming, just shut up please. Also the context menus are super noisy, I tried cutting some bits out in config, but there's just so much crap in there. Obviously all the AI stuff, but ", "context": "", "use_case": "browser", "switched_from": "", "story": "Leaving Mozilla"}]}, {"label": "Open development", "summary": "Commenters say patches are welcomed and praise its Starlark-based build system.", "quotes": [{"id": 774559313, "item_id": 48409957, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48409957", "by": "nh2", "date": "2026-06-05", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "It seems much easier to use Firefox or Chromium, where my fixes actually meet open ears.", "excerpt": "> There will not be a [..] process for submitting patches by [any] means > Outside involvement still matters: clear bug reports So I can find a bug, I can fix it, but I am not allowed to tell them how exactly I did it. Instead they have to re-figure it out. The team must be thrilled to re-do work they know was already put in by others, repeatedly. As a user-and-eveloper, why would I sink time into a project with such", "context": "developer who contributes patches", "use_case": "browser, contributing fixes", "switched_from": "", "story": "Changing How We Develop Ladybird"}, {"id": 798150336, "item_id": 49884396, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49884396", "by": "okanat", "date": "2026-09-28", "stance": "compare", "quote": "Chromium has a better build system using Starlark.", "excerpt": "Not license, it is the codebase and tooling. Waterfox and LibreWolf exist. However FF code base is a bit a mess compared to Chromium. Chromium has a better build system using Starlark. Starlark is quite resilient against exploding complexity and easier to keep C++ codebases sane. Mozilla's build system is a soup of multiple tools. Firefox used to use Mercury and only lately switched to Git. The origins of Chromium co", "context": "", "use_case": "browser engine codebase", "switched_from": "", "story": "I switched to Brave"}]}, {"label": "Scriptable", "summary": "Users script it with throwaway profiles or run it in Docker driven over CDP.", "quotes": [{"id": 793648048, "item_id": 49603003, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49603003", "by": "aftbit", "date": "2026-09-07", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "It just starts a clean Chromium with a throw-away profile", "excerpt": "I have a handy little script called `chrome-new` which I use whenever I want to browse one of those few sites that struggles with Firefox. It just starts a clean Chromium with a throw-away profile, then deletes it when I close the browser. #!/bin/sh TMPDIR=$(mktemp -d /dev/shm/chrome-XXXXX) chromium --user-data-dir=$TMPDIR --no-first-run --no-default-browser-check --disable-features=DefaultBrowserPrompt \"$@\" rm -rf $", "context": "", "use_case": "browsing sites that break in Firefox", "switched_from": "", "story": "My practical approach to surfing the web safely"}, {"id": 765076737, "item_id": 47817296, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47817296", "by": "mugseller26", "date": "2026-04-18", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Launch a chromium docker instance w. URL and send JS to click on the play button", "excerpt": "Interesting I had the exact same problem, wonder how you handle searching / playing the specific game you wanna watch (in jellyfin I suppose?) The way I solved it is write a small server process that 1. Takes in a game keyword I want to watch (eg Celtics) 2. Go on to stream site, scrape the game and follow to the video URL 3. Launch a chromium docker instance w. URL and send JS to click on the play button lol (CDP) 4", "context": "homelab", "use_case": "playing streams headlessly", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: I pipe free sports streams into Jellyfin \u2013 no ads, just HLS"}]}], "caveats": [{"label": "Bloated codebase", "summary": "Some commenters call the Chromium source bloated and hard to maintain.", "quotes": [{"id": 786254912, "item_id": 49140932, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49140932", "by": "rustfreeforme", "date": "2026-08-01", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Chromium, as a result, is a giant, bloated, buggy heap of shit, THAT CANNOT be properly maintained IN ANY LANGUAGE, due to the extreme level of bloat.", "excerpt": "> if I were to make a guess This is your problem. You keep guessing, and guessing, and guessing, constantly missing the mark. You just really, really, really want to be right, but you just really, really, really aren't. > But to spin this the other way around: in lieu of the Bun case, why not use it to rewrite the project in Rust, Zig, D or any language of your choice (yes, even C)? Because as I just explained to you", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Google fixed more Chrome bugs in June than over the past two years, thanks to AI"}, {"id": 786220736, "item_id": 49138796, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49138796", "by": "rustfreeforme", "date": "2026-08-01", "stance": "warn", "quote": "the Chromium source, which is a gigantic flaming heap of trash", "excerpt": "> The problem is that you think Rust programmers despise C or C++. No, I just checked, and there is no problem detected here. It does not matter if you despise C/C++ or not. The fact of the matter is--and it's very simple: YOUR ENTIRE WORLD IS BUILT ON C/C++. EVERYTHING YOU BUILD ON RUST IS THEREFORE BUILT ON THAT FOUNDATION. YOU ARE 100% DEPENDENT ON C++ AND--SHOCK, HORROR--C. FACT. Saying Rust is the replacement fo", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Google fixed more Chrome bugs in June than over the past two years, thanks to AI"}]}, {"label": "RAM usage", "summary": "One commenter says it uses a lot of memory.", "quotes": [{"id": 801899425, "item_id": 50118714, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50118714", "by": "rmunn", "date": "2026-10-16", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Chromium seem to just gobble up RAM", "excerpt": "> Upstream is just giving them software for free on an as-is basis. While the \"we're entitled to bugfixes\" attitude is definitely annoying for software maintainers to deal with, and you (as the end user) aren't entitled to anything from 99% of open-source projects... this is Chromium we're talking about. The browser engine that powers 75-95% of all Web browsing (it's very hard to pin down actual numbers, but it's hug", "context": "", "use_case": "web browsing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Comparing Chromium Development at Google and Igalia"}]}, {"label": "Extension limits", "summary": "One commenter avoids Chromium browsers over incomplete extension and ad-blocking support.", "quotes": [{"id": 775025441, "item_id": 48439090, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48439090", "by": "satvikpendem", "date": "2026-06-07", "stance": "warn", "quote": "not using any Chromium browsers, especially due to not having full extension and adblocking support", "excerpt": "> is Chromium-based Yeah I'm out, not using any Chromium browsers, especially due to not having full extension and adblocking support. I'm not sure when you used Firefox but I don't find it slow at all, seems to be on par with Chrome and Safari.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Tell HN: Helium is the best browser I ever used"}]}, {"label": "Trust concerns", "summary": "One commenter runs it only when required, isolated under bubblewrap and a separate user account.", "quotes": [{"id": 779916758, "item_id": 48744797, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48744797", "by": "anthk", "date": "2026-07-01", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Crapium because of $CORPORATE, isolated under bubblewrap and a separate user account", "excerpt": "It's still there, at IRC/Usenet/some niche forums. Replace phreaking with maybe some mesh networks and ways to connect computers without calling an ISP. There are still niche blogs and even phlogs. And you can still use Pidgin and libpurple plugins to connect to a huge array of protocols. Ditto with core Biltbee or Bitlbee+libpurple allowing you to use any IRC client (even the ones without TLS for DOS and Win9X) to c", "context": "", "use_case": "work-required browser", "switched_from": "", "story": "The Internet I Grew Up with Doesn't Exist Anymore"}]}], "who": [{"by": "monneyboi", "context": "Linux user", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50143351", "date": "2026-10-18"}, {"by": "SoKamil", "context": "iOS user", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48613748", "date": "2026-06-20"}, {"by": "dvh", "context": "web developer", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48472879", "date": "2026-06-10"}, {"by": "nh2", "context": "developer who contributes patches", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48409957", "date": "2026-06-05"}, {"by": "mugseller26", "context": "homelab", "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47817296", "date": "2026-04-18"}], "tags": ["for Linux users", "as a fallback browser", "for web developers", "for browser automation"], "use_cases": ["web browsing", "fallback browser", "browser", "buying train tickets", "browser engine codebase", "daily browsing"], "compared": [{"slug": "firefox", "name": "Firefox", "co": 25, "switched_from": 3, "switched_to": 1}, {"slug": "safari", "name": "Safari", "co": 6, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "chrome", "name": "Chrome", "co": 5, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "zen", "name": "Zen", "co": 4, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "ublock-origin", "name": "uBlock Origin", "co": 3, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "brave", "name": "Brave", "co": 2, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}, {"slug": "ladybird", "name": "Ladybird", "co": 2, "switched_from": 0, "switched_to": 0}], "makers": [], "threads": [{"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49120097", "title": "Google fixed more Chrome bugs in June than over the past two years, thanks to AI", "mentions": 2}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50141657", "title": "Websites are closing their doors to AI agents", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50112887", "title": "Comparing Chromium Development at Google and Igalia", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49878759", "title": "I switched to Brave", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49696697", "title": "Ubuntu 26.10 completes transition to Rust-based coreutils", "mentions": 1}, {"url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49536195", "title": "My practical approach to surfing the web safely", "mentions": 1}], "sentiment_by_month": {"2025-11": {"recommend": 1}, "2025-12": {}, "2026-01": {"neutral": 1}, "2026-02": {}, "2026-03": {"neutral": 1}, "2026-04": {"neutral": 1}, "2026-05": {"neutral": 1}, "2026-06": {"recommend": 4, "warn": 1, "neutral": 1}, "2026-07": {"warn": 1}, "2026-08": {"warn": 1}, "2026-09": {"neutral": 2, "recommend": 1, "compare": 1}, "2026-10": {"warn": 1, "neutral": 1}}, "quotes": [{"id": 802293616, "item_id": 50143351, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50143351", "by": "monneyboi", "date": "2026-10-18", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I now have to `pacman -S chromium` to buy tickets from Deutche Bahn", "excerpt": "If only it would be possible to \"close your doors to AI agents\". It's not I'm afraid. Where do you draw the line? What browser is allowed? For example, I now have to `pacman -S chromium` to buy tickets from Deutche Bahn. They accuse me of being a bot when I use firefox on linux. It's a known problem, and I think stuff like this will only get worse the longer this cat and mouse goes on.", "context": "Linux user", "use_case": "buying train tickets", "switched_from": "Firefox", "story": "Websites are closing their doors to AI agents"}, {"id": 801899425, "item_id": 50118714, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50118714", "by": "rmunn", "date": "2026-10-16", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Chromium seem to just gobble up RAM", "excerpt": "> Upstream is just giving them software for free on an as-is basis. While the \"we're entitled to bugfixes\" attitude is definitely annoying for software maintainers to deal with, and you (as the end user) aren't entitled to anything from 99% of open-source projects... this is Chromium we're talking about. The browser engine that powers 75-95% of all Web browsing (it's very hard to pin down actual numbers, but it's hug", "context": "", "use_case": "web browsing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Comparing Chromium Development at Google and Igalia"}, {"id": 798150336, "item_id": 49884396, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49884396", "by": "okanat", "date": "2026-09-28", "stance": "compare", "quote": "Chromium has a better build system using Starlark.", "excerpt": "Not license, it is the codebase and tooling. Waterfox and LibreWolf exist. However FF code base is a bit a mess compared to Chromium. Chromium has a better build system using Starlark. Starlark is quite resilient against exploding complexity and easier to keep C++ codebases sane. Mozilla's build system is a soup of multiple tools. Firefox used to use Mercury and only lately switched to Git. The origins of Chromium co", "context": "", "use_case": "browser engine codebase", "switched_from": "", "story": "I switched to Brave"}, {"id": 795353441, "item_id": 49709590, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49709590", "by": "IlikeMadison", "date": "2026-09-15", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "my firefox and chromium running as snaps never crashed a single time for as long as I can remember", "excerpt": "sandboxing a browser makes total sense. my firefox and chromium running as snaps never crashed a single time for as long as I can remember, and I use both every day, at the same time.", "context": "", "use_case": "daily browsing", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ubuntu 26.10 completes transition to Rust-based coreutils"}, {"id": 793648048, "item_id": 49603003, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49603003", "by": "aftbit", "date": "2026-09-07", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "It just starts a clean Chromium with a throw-away profile", "excerpt": "I have a handy little script called `chrome-new` which I use whenever I want to browse one of those few sites that struggles with Firefox. It just starts a clean Chromium with a throw-away profile, then deletes it when I close the browser. #!/bin/sh TMPDIR=$(mktemp -d /dev/shm/chrome-XXXXX) chromium --user-data-dir=$TMPDIR --no-first-run --no-default-browser-check --disable-features=DefaultBrowserPrompt \"$@\" rm -rf $", "context": "", "use_case": "browsing sites that break in Firefox", "switched_from": "", "story": "My practical approach to surfing the web safely"}, {"id": 792527249, "item_id": 49532953, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49532953", "by": "fooker", "date": "2026-09-02", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "If I always have to have Chromium installed as a fallback, might as well use it.", "excerpt": "The usual culprits are government, bank, or google websites. Youtube and Google docs occasionally break in amusing ways. Definitely Google's fault to a large extent, but it is what it is. A friend recently got into making JS games, the FPS is always unplayable on Firefox. I'm not going to be snotty and ask someone doing this for fun to test stuff on multiple browsers. SVG rendering occasionally slows down to a crawl.", "context": "", "use_case": "fallback browser", "switched_from": "", "story": "Hang on to Your Firefox"}, {"id": 786254912, "item_id": 49140932, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49140932", "by": "rustfreeforme", "date": "2026-08-01", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Chromium, as a result, is a giant, bloated, buggy heap of shit, THAT CANNOT be properly maintained IN ANY LANGUAGE, due to the extreme level of bloat.", "excerpt": "> if I were to make a guess This is your problem. You keep guessing, and guessing, and guessing, constantly missing the mark. You just really, really, really want to be right, but you just really, really, really aren't. > But to spin this the other way around: in lieu of the Bun case, why not use it to rewrite the project in Rust, Zig, D or any language of your choice (yes, even C)? Because as I just explained to you", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Google fixed more Chrome bugs in June than over the past two years, thanks to AI"}, {"id": 786220736, "item_id": 49138796, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49138796", "by": "rustfreeforme", "date": "2026-08-01", "stance": "warn", "quote": "the Chromium source, which is a gigantic flaming heap of trash", "excerpt": "> The problem is that you think Rust programmers despise C or C++. No, I just checked, and there is no problem detected here. It does not matter if you despise C/C++ or not. The fact of the matter is--and it's very simple: YOUR ENTIRE WORLD IS BUILT ON C/C++. EVERYTHING YOU BUILD ON RUST IS THEREFORE BUILT ON THAT FOUNDATION. YOU ARE 100% DEPENDENT ON C++ AND--SHOCK, HORROR--C. FACT. Saying Rust is the replacement fo", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Google fixed more Chrome bugs in June than over the past two years, thanks to AI"}, {"id": 779916758, "item_id": 48744797, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48744797", "by": "anthk", "date": "2026-07-01", "stance": "warn", "quote": "Crapium because of $CORPORATE, isolated under bubblewrap and a separate user account", "excerpt": "It's still there, at IRC/Usenet/some niche forums. Replace phreaking with maybe some mesh networks and ways to connect computers without calling an ISP. There are still niche blogs and even phlogs. And you can still use Pidgin and libpurple plugins to connect to a huge array of protocols. Ditto with core Biltbee or Bitlbee+libpurple allowing you to use any IRC client (even the ones without TLS for DOS and Win9X) to c", "context": "", "use_case": "work-required browser", "switched_from": "", "story": "The Internet I Grew Up with Doesn't Exist Anymore"}, {"id": 778311025, "item_id": 48644439, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48644439", "by": "CobaltFire", "date": "2026-06-23", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Chromium if I have to for something.", "excerpt": "Safari for most things, Chromium if I have to for something. I didn't toss those there because those (and IDEs and SSH/Terminal clients) are very opinionated and everyone has their favorites.", "context": "", "use_case": "fallback browser", "switched_from": "", "story": "Ask HN: New clean macOS install. Must-have apps? Best browser?"}, {"id": 777819969, "item_id": 48613748, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48613748", "by": "SoKamil", "date": "2026-06-20", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Chromium is snappier in comparison, has no scrolling or hitbox glitches, does not crash on heavier websites.", "excerpt": "I'm an iOS user, but each time I use Android, I envy them their browser. Safari is just so sluggish - Chromium is snappier in comparison, has no scrolling or hitbox glitches, does not crash on heavier websites. I'm proponent of the open web so I hope this will encourage iOS's Safari to compete.", "context": "iOS user", "use_case": "mobile browsing on Android", "switched_from": "", "story": "28% Faster: Blink Prototype That Shows Why Apple iOS Browser Engine Ban Must End"}, {"id": 776246625, "item_id": 48515414, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48515414", "by": "CamouflagedKiwi", "date": "2026-06-13", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Chromium feels like a solid product.", "excerpt": "Yeah, definitely agree with this. I still use Firefox a bit on some machines but it is constantly popping up little things - \"are you finding tabs overwhelming? try tab groups\" / \"try vertical tabs\" / whatever. I'm not finding them overwhelming, just shut up please. Also the context menus are super noisy, I tried cutting some bits out in config, but there's just so much crap in there. Obviously all the AI stuff, but ", "context": "", "use_case": "browser", "switched_from": "", "story": "Leaving Mozilla"}, {"id": 775566064, "item_id": 48472879, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48472879", "by": "dvh", "date": "2026-06-10", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "Chromium is significantly faster (maybe 5 to 10x faster on certain tasks mostly around canvas", "excerpt": "There are 2 reasons why I'm using chromium (with ublock origin lite) over Firefox: 1. Chromium is significantly faster (maybe 5 to 10x faster on certain tasks mostly around canvas but anything that requires fast ui really). Every time I use Firefox it feels like it has some kind of serious problem. If chrome was this slow I would stop working and start investigating what part of my computer is broken. This experience", "context": "web developer", "use_case": "web development", "switched_from": "Firefox", "story": "Google Chrome is killing all uBlock Origin bypasses, Edge, Opera to follow"}, {"id": 775025441, "item_id": 48439090, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48439090", "by": "satvikpendem", "date": "2026-06-07", "stance": "warn", "quote": "not using any Chromium browsers, especially due to not having full extension and adblocking support", "excerpt": "> is Chromium-based Yeah I'm out, not using any Chromium browsers, especially due to not having full extension and adblocking support. I'm not sure when you used Firefox but I don't find it slow at all, seems to be on par with Chrome and Safari.", "context": "", "use_case": "", "switched_from": "", "story": "Tell HN: Helium is the best browser I ever used"}, {"id": 774559313, "item_id": 48409957, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48409957", "by": "nh2", "date": "2026-06-05", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "It seems much easier to use Firefox or Chromium, where my fixes actually meet open ears.", "excerpt": "> There will not be a [..] process for submitting patches by [any] means > Outside involvement still matters: clear bug reports So I can find a bug, I can fix it, but I am not allowed to tell them how exactly I did it. Instead they have to re-figure it out. The team must be thrilled to re-do work they know was already put in by others, repeatedly. As a user-and-eveloper, why would I sink time into a project with such", "context": "developer who contributes patches", "use_case": "browser, contributing fixes", "switched_from": "", "story": "Changing How We Develop Ladybird"}, {"id": 767660499, "item_id": 47978781, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47978781", "by": "roscas", "date": "2026-05-01", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Remember that chromium is trying to open perplexity.ai", "excerpt": "Hum, I will use perplexity to find what is the mistery in here. Remember that chromium is trying to open perplexity.ai and I don't know what triggered it, even if it was something outside of chromium. So far, I cannot blame anyone... yet. update: I also cannot exclude Firefox that I use at the same time and opensnitch caught the request but shows chromium instead of firefox.", "context": "", "use_case": "browsing", "switched_from": "", "story": "How can perplexity.com persist on the browser without extension"}, {"id": 765076737, "item_id": 47817296, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47817296", "by": "mugseller26", "date": "2026-04-18", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "Launch a chromium docker instance w. URL and send JS to click on the play button", "excerpt": "Interesting I had the exact same problem, wonder how you handle searching / playing the specific game you wanna watch (in jellyfin I suppose?) The way I solved it is write a small server process that 1. Takes in a game keyword I want to watch (eg Celtics) 2. Go on to stream site, scrape the game and follow to the video URL 3. Launch a chromium docker instance w. URL and send JS to click on the play button lol (CDP) 4", "context": "homelab", "use_case": "playing streams headlessly", "switched_from": "", "story": "Show HN: I pipe free sports streams into Jellyfin \u2013 no ads, just HLS"}, {"id": 760785393, "item_id": 47549087, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47549087", "by": "TacticalCoder", "date": "2026-03-27", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I've got chromium too but typically I use Firefox.", "excerpt": "Weird. I've got two Firefox instances, from two different user accounts, opened at all times. Tens of tabs in each. I know some people do hundreds of tabs. I've got zero issue. I've got chromium too but typically I use Firefox. My only hack is I wrap Firefox with a TCP_NO_DELAY lib: probably cargo culting a bit but I do feel it's even snappier that way. P.S: main desktop is an AMD 7700X with only 32 GB of RAM. Nothin", "context": "", "use_case": "secondary browser", "switched_from": "", "story": "Firefox is and always has been terrible"}, {"id": 743806468, "item_id": 46487904, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46487904", "by": "whalesalad", "date": "2026-01-04", "stance": "neutral", "quote": "I use chromium as my browser", "excerpt": "I\u2019ve been using Wayland on Debian 12 since 2023. On an Apple Studio Display (5K) over thunderbolt (the built-in camera, speakers, etc work fine) I screen share and video call with Slack and Google Meet. I use alacritty/zsh/tmux as my terminal. I use chromium as my browser, vscode and sublime text as code editors. Slack, Spotify, my studio mic, my Scarlett 2i2, 10gbe networking, thunderbolt, Logitech unifying receiver", "context": "", "use_case": "browser", "switched_from": "", "story": "Can I start using Wayland in 2026?"}, {"id": 736812944, "item_id": 46050809, "url": "https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46050809", "by": "NaomiLehman", "date": "2025-11-25", "stance": "recommend", "quote": "I switched from Firefox to Chromium because of speed.", "excerpt": "I switched from Firefox to Chromium because of speed.", "context": "", "use_case": "web browsing", "switched_from": "Firefox", "story": "Orion 1.0"}]}