Firefox Quantum is Now the Best Browser, True or Bold

November 7, 2022

Firefox has just released the Quantum version in less than a week, claiming they have a faster, more responsive browser over Chrome.

The first four (4) tests are performed by Laptop Mag, using a Dell XPS 13 laptop with i7-7660U processor and 16GB of RAM while the remaining four (4) are run using i5-2500K processor and 8GB of RAM.

  1. WebXPRT 2015, was used to test a range of basic, everyday tasks of HTMl5- and JavaScript-based workloads, where higher is better
     
  2. Octane 2.0, was used run JavaScript benchmark of 21 individual tests, of course developed by Google
     
  3. BrowserBench’s JetStream 1.1, used to measure JavaScript benchmarks
     
  4. PassMark AppTimer, to measure opening and closing of 50 windows on average
     
  5. Hardware resources consumed when running
    1. During the initial startup, without any tabs
      1. Chrome –  179.2 MB
      2. Firefox – 194.0 MB
    2. After 30 tabs
      1. Chrome – 4151.3 MB
      2. Firefox – 3883 MB
    3. Even so, Firefox was noticed being sluggish when keeping up with multiple simultaneous YouTube video streams. It may be because of the lack of RAM consumed. However, both tabs flipped through and closed tabs snappily.
    4. Despite consuming lesser resources, the lack of responsiveness may be the main issue that users are not happy with. No one would like to have a browser that does not support multi-tasking. With RAM getting cheaper and larger over the years, what is the burden of an extra 14.8 MB in a stick of 4 GB/ 4096 MB RAM?
    5. Changing to the perspective where each penny is important, WHO, or even more precisely – which type of user would open 30 tabs simultaneously at a time? Taking into consideration where remembering that particular tab position by navigating along super-minimized tabs will be almost mission impossible!
       
  6. Ares-6, to measure new JavaScript functions performance

    Taking into consideration of future web development, new functions will be implemented SOON. Comparing the fact that Firefox is able to overcome Chrome at less than a fraction when it comes to calculations, this performance measurement should be taken into consideration much more.
     
  7. Speedometer, to measure response time of user actions
  8. Real-world Speed Test:
    1. Mashable
    2. New York Times
    3. National Geographic
    4. CNN
    5. Amazon

Chrome performs better on National  Geographic, CNN, and Mashable whereas Firefox performs better on Amazon, and the New York Times.

Overall, Firefox deserves an applause for the arduous work; although they did not topple over Chrome. The page-load time does matter to everyone, but the difference of milliseconds will not make users realize the actual difference. Furthermore, the hard disk improvements over the years will make this difference even minor as they are the ones that render the program. Only time will tell whether Firefox’s effort can catch up with Chrome, but not for another 2-3 years when another major patch has been released!

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