With Opera recently releasing their web browser completely free of Ads, it is a good time to let the truth be told. Not only is Opera Faster then Firefox in all performance areas, it is much more Secure and more Compliant.
Performance
Firefox is often mentioned as a light-weight performance browser. It is also touted as being faster than other browsers. This is far from the truth. These tests clearly show Opera outperforming all other Graphical Browsers in Windows. It should be noted that Mozilla and Internet Explorer both outperform Firefox.
Security
Secunia shows Opera 8.x to only have 1 out of 13 vulnerabilities unpatched. While Firefox 1.x has 3 out of 26 vulnerabilities upatched. Clearly Opera is the more Secure Web Browser.
Compliance
The Acid2 Browser Test is a test page, written to help browser vendors ensure proper support for web standards in their products. Althought the Acid2 Browser Test does not test every web standard, it clearly shows that Opera is more compliant with the features considered most important for the future of the web.
Opera v9 Acid2 Browser Test Results
Firefox v1.5 Acid2 Browser Test Results
Conclusion
With the obvious superiority of Opera to Firefox in Speed, Security and Compliance why is it not being recommended as much? That is a good question. Features that people really care about such as integrated Search, Tabs and Pop-up Blocking have been in Opera way before Firefox even existed. The last obstacle of price is no longer one. Opera is now free.
17 comments:
Regarding performance: Have any optimizations been run on Firefox? I think not.
Regarding security: To take one of your philosophies: "Opera still has outstanding unpatched vulnerabilities. Fanboy response? "Firefox has more" and that makes Opera secure how?"
Regarding acid2: You got me there. The Mozilla team needs to step it up in that area.
He has a build that is "optimized" and it made no difference. But in any speed test you need to compare default installs. Otherwise you would have to optimize both.
It doesn't make it secure, it makes it MORE secure.
Opera is great but it lacks one huge feature that has made Firefox speed ahead of it. Extensions! The extensions are the real power of the browser that no one seems to talk about much. I have opera installed but Firefox is so much more customized to me than Opera can ever be at this point in time. So thus I only use firefox.
I agree on the extensions point: they rock!! Whatever miliseconds Firefox misses to Opera it more than makes up with extensions...
Agent Smith: You are funny!
"Opera still has outstanding unpatched vulnerabilities. Fanboy response? "Firefox has more" and that makes Opera secure how?"
Making the statement that Opera is more secure than Firefox with only the evidence of less publically disclosed vulnerabilities is risky.
You being a lackey and all, I'm sure you can get the source to Opera and release it to the public domain -- thus giving the oppurtunity of a more in depht security audit to occur.
I agree that extensions really do make firefox such a cool browser, and all of the themes of course. I don't know and if someone could tell me that would be great, does Opera have native support for at least some Scaleable Vector Graphics.
the main reason i don't recommend opera to anyone is it isn't free software... maybe its free in costs, but as long as the source isn't BSD or GPL or something like that, one shouldn't use it. duh...
and under linux one can use konqueror, almost as fast as opera, and with much better integration in KDE, extensions and some other nice features.
A software with a single vulnerability is as exploitable as ten vulnerabilities.
I switched from Opera to Firefox when Firefox 0.1 was announced because of the ads in Opera at that time.
One of the reasons why I'm reluctant to switch back are that there is a lot going on for Firefox now with more sites rendering correctly in it. Even though I don't use many of Firefox's extensions, I feel safer sticking with Firefox just in case a really cool extension comes out.
Another reason I like Firefox better is Arabic support. In todays i18n standards, Arabic support in Firefox is medicore, but Opera's is virtually non-existent.
"I have an idea. How about you target your concerns with making sure that no one gains a monopoly on the market, and then we concentrate on competing on merit."
That is your problem. I'm not here to fight Microsoft. I'm here to tell people the truth. Opera is a better browser.
"You are right Opera is probably outperforms Firefox, but Free Software is still better."
Really? Opera is free in any way the average user cares about.
No Spam or insults are allowed.
If Opera had the customization options that Firefox has (Extensions, and not just a few lame ones.), then I'd drop Firefox in a heartbeat. Until then, I will stick with the "Have it your way" browser, for better or worse, for richer or poorer. :)
Here are some stupid little slogans/descriptions of the browsers that I thought up for no particular reason.
Firefox - "Have it your way"
Opera - "Everything that WE think you want, and a bunch of stuff you probably don't"
IE - "Our way or the highway"
Safari - "All you have to do is change your lifestyle completely..."
I've used extensions myself and they are not that great. It took numerous extensions to get FF to work the same as opera does. Not worth it IMO, it was easier to simply just use Opera. BTW you can customize Opera easily.
Yes, some features in Firefox extensions are in Opera by default, but extensions allow Firefox to do things that Opera will probably never do. Sure, some extensions are useless to different people. The beauty of it is that you don't need to download them all. In Opera they give you by default features that some groups of people don't need. I, for instance don't need integrated voice and mail functions. Is that not more "bloated" than intalling only the features you want? And I've never noticed or cared about any milliseconds lost in loading times. I have also never experienced the effects of any security holes in Firefox personally. I actually have to TRY to crash Firefox, because it's never crashed at any other time. Opera may have User Javascript, but Firefox has that and extensions. Until Opera offers the features that I want, I'm sticking with Firefox. Once Opera actually does what I want, I'll drop Firefox with no remorse. I'm not particulary loyal to any browser, but you guys are treating Firefox as if it were a worthless piece of...stuff, when it's better than that. At least it's better than IE. The thing is that no bunch of random people posting comments on a random blog are going to change anyone's mind about their browser of choice. So, why exactly is anyone posting here? Because I know I'm stopping.
I am really begining to believe people don't do any research or try anything out for themselves. They simply here something from someone and declare it the best. Seriously I honestly evaluated Firefox from day one but this was after using Netscape, IE, Avant, Opera and all the other Browsers including Mozilla. Nothing about it impressed me. Opera on the other hand and Avant both impressed me much more then the hyped extensions to firefox. I think I had to install two or three extensions to get FF to use Tabs remotely how I could already in Opera and Avant. I've tried all these other extensions and am not impressed, good features should come with the Browser by default.
This is not about changing people's mind but opening them up to reality. People seem to get upset that the facts about FF don't add up to the reality. What can I say?
Firefox is just a Web Browser. If it didn't have all this Hype and the Open Source, Linux and Anti-Microsoft crowd behind it would be nothing special.
AGA, you obviously haven't heard anything about "doctype-switching" which is available in all modern browsers (including Opera, Firefox and Safari). Maybe you should learn something about it and you may find a cure for your "problems" with Opera ;)
Andrew, where did you get the image of Opera passing Acid2? I was just testing my all new Opera 8.51, but this one still has some glitches...
Or where these introduced between 8.5 and 8.51?
That image is from Opera 9.
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