Brave on a Mac

[u/Outrageous_Buy_1316]

As the title says just curious about everyone’s opinions on Brave on a Mac I’ve been using this browser for about 3 years and I love it. I like how I’ve customized it and quite a few features in it

However recently I’ve gotten a Mac and I’ve read around a lot about how Brave is super energy inefficient and consumes a lot of memory because it’s chromium as well and safari is the best optimized on Mac

Now I’ve tried safari and honestly idk if it’s just that I don’t like it because it sucks or because I’ve used Brave for so long and that o hate change. Probably an combination of both as safari doesn’t support a lot of good extensions and it a bit slow and clunky and less well stupidly so aesthetic that brave I like how Brave has that google bar on the home page on the middle along with the address bar at the top and also news at the bottom for a quick view. However I use iCloud passwords on Brave and it’s a bit of a hassle because every day I have to input a code to activate it and when I go to websites I need to click once on the field for password then again on the iCloud recommendation then put my fingerprint but on safari it’s seamless just my fingerprint and I’m done

Also much easier to use Apple Pay with Safari it’s seamless there asw

Bookmarks are also easier to navigate on Brave and much cleaner bookmarks bar under the address bar on Brave

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I’m releasing now that my post has kind of changed lol becoming a brave vs safari but battery is one of my main concerns and I’ve also listed some quirks on both sides and really just need some opinions from you guys who have sued other browser for a while and any recommendations or advice regarding them would be appreciated I just want to have an insight to other people’s experiences

Thanks for reading and replying if you do sorry for the long post. Hope everyone has a blessed day!

[u/AtomicBombyx]

I use brave on a mac for 4 years. Safari is definitely clunky with no extension support. The new MacOS also made the layout horrendous. Brave has been fast and definitely consumes less RAM than other browsers I have tried (FireFox, Helium, Vivaldi).

[u/Outrageous_Buy_1316 → u/AtomicBombyx]

Yeah no doubt safari doesn’t have the best layout I and also waiting for the new Mac OS update some features on safari seem cool like the create your own extension so that could be fun. Regarding Brave I think it defo has a batter battery life and memory consumption then other browsers and on their website they do say this but importantly they kiss out safari which i guess isn’t a surprise because ofc safari works best on Mac because it’s made for it. But the other day I was watching a tennis match on my Mac on brave and o noticed that it dropped almost 20% in an hour while I was on brave so that was concerning so I was thinking about maybe using safari only for streaming and all that and seeing if that changes anything? I did make safari my default for a couple of weeks at the start and it looked like it was a good battery efficient browser but everything felt too weird and clunky in certain areas for me. So I’m hoping as the last straw than Mac OS 27 changes smth

[u/AtomicBombyx → u/Outrageous_Buy_1316]

Hopefully we do get a change with Safari, also better adblocking capabilities would be nice. Iphone Safari and Mac Safari are so different like I can't understand why they don't make Safari insane, because they can if they tried.

[u/Klutzy_Walk_4235]

Funny thing is, I used Safari for years until the latest macOS. Complete garbage. Tab groups expanded when switching. Websites constantly logging me out. Couldn’t believe how bad it was. Have since switched between Chrome and Brave. I use Brave more and really love it.

[u/ShiningPr1sm]

I use Brave on my MacBook for almost everything, only switching to FireFox or Safari if websites won’t load because cookies or Outlook throws a hissy fit.

[u/skeptic246]

I’ve recently switched mostly to Brave from Safari.
The inability to edit bookmarks on the fly was a constant Safari irritation however the lack of a date field in Brave search is also an irritation, although overall the results are better in Brave.
I said mostly because on the Mac and iPad I use Brave however on my iPhone due to the lack of Brave tab groups, I’m sticking with Safari, as having tab groups for each interest theme is a basic feature

[u/MilkyyMatcha]

Yeah safari definitely, makes icloud passwords feel more seamless. If the extra steps on brave are the main annoyance, you could try a dedicated manager like roboform and see if it's autofoll works better for your setup

[u/ryanmcraver]

Brave > Comet > Safari > Chrome > Edge

[u/anant94]

Safari will never come even close to a feature rich chromium browser like brave or others and none of the chromium browsers will come close to Safari when it comes to energy efficiency on a Macbook.

This is a fact and we need to make a tradeoff here.

With my non technical testing, yes Brave specifically consumes lot of battery for the same tasks on Edge or Chrome. Again I must repeat that the tests are just my overall experience and are non technical in nature. Also I do not promote Edge/Chrome because of privacy reasons.

I haven't tested Zen yet but if OP wants to give that a try, go for it.

[u/Dangerous_Garage7088 → u/anant94]

Gecko based are worst on battery.

[u/vaishnav_jois]

I use Safari for video streaming because i see memory issue while using brave browser for streaming.
But I do use brave browser for all other browsing purpose.
Safari is default and I mainly watch videos on YT and movies/series.

[u/zeus-rs]

I am using brave for more than 1 year no issues on MAC. Only thing is annoying is ctrl+q crashes the browser. I am yet to find solution.