What is the best Android web browser?
Opera Mini Browser
Android Market rating: 4 stars
Downloads: > 250,000
Google Search: Search works fine, but I don’t like the separate boxes for an URL and a Google search term. All other browsers have one box that does both.
YouTube Test: Ouch, this is painful, YouTube’s new mobile site clearly doesn’t work in Opera Mini. The layout is all messed up.
Mobile Guru Test: It works, but doesn’t look as good is in the other browsers, it seems like Opera is adding some extra cornered elements to it and all the sudden there’s a link to my RSS feed at the top, which shouldn’t be there.
Overall: I’m not a big fan of Opera Mini, and it’s the only browser that clearly messes up some dedicated mobile sites. Also, there’s a toolbar on the screen which I don’t need to use and the URL bar is on screen all the time. Which makes the actual web page space (or ‘screen estate’) around 20% less than with other mobile browsers. Still it’s kinda clever, just not my kind of clever, I don’t like too many buttons, shortcuts, links etc. I don’t even bookmark more than 3 sites.
Dolphin HD Browser
Android Market rating: 4.5 stars
Downloads: >250,000
Google Search: Just works great, keyword input works straight from the address bar, it shows the mobile version of Google and directly switches to full screen browsing after you hit ‘go’.
YouTube Test: For HTML5 optimized sites, like YouTube mobile, the full screen browsing really brings an app feel to the site. Furthermore, video playback works like it should too.
Mobile Guru Test: Once again, the full screen browsing gives an app feel to the site, which is exactly what the guys from BraveNewCode wanted when they developed their WP Touch plugin. Speed is ok too.
Overall: Dolphin is the best browser of these four, the full screen browsing without really missing any buttons is a perfect example of how to integrate with the hardware of Android phones (it’s not all touch screen, there’s buttons on the actual device too).
Android Default Browser
Android Market rating: Installed by default, so no ratings.
Downloads: Installed by default, every Android has got one.
Google Search: Works fine, but can’t handle other installed browsers. When clicking links it asks to open them with other browsers. Everytime.
YouTube Test: Works perfectly, videos load quite fast.
Mobile Guru Test: Nothing notable, about as fast as the others.
Overall: Pretty good for a default browser, there is no real need to download any other. I only came across Dolphin out of curiosity, not frustration about this one.
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Steel Browser
Android Market rating: 4 stars
Downloads: >250,000
Google Search: It doesn’t automatically show the mobile version of Google, so you’ll see the PC web version with very small text.
YouTube Test: The speed is ok, but it doesn’t playback videos, which makes using YouTube impossible.
Mobile Guru Test: Very fast, like all other browsers. It seems like the combination of WordPress and the WP Touch plugin is perfect for mobile browsing.
Overall: Steel is definitely the worst browser of these four.
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The Guru Verdict
The Android default browser isn’t bad for a default browser, but other downloadable browsers do offer some extra functionality and different design. I’m using Dolphin for a while now and am really starting to like the feel of it. Especially the full screen browsing in Dolphin is great. The Steel Browser just doesn’t do what it should do, so would be the last browser to use on Android phones. The design of Opera Mini has never really appealed to me, I don’t like all the boxes, links and shortcuts. Also, I love it when an address bar works for both the input of URLs and googling. Opera Mini has two fields for this, which just doesn’t seem very efficient.
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MobileGuru.nl is the home of Peter Evers, a 25 year old guy from Amsterdam
who worked on several mobile marketing jobs in both Amsterdam and London. From 2007 he experienced the rising of the mobile internet and massive growth in the mobile application area from the inside. Currently Peter runs yoMedia, a mobile software company based in Amsterdam. On this blog he sheds his light on the latest developments in mobile marketing and technology.
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What about Skyfire? I’ve been trying that a bit lately and am fairly impressed. Also, hoping to get my hands on the firefox beta soon.
Hi Richard, to be honest I kinda underestimated the Skyfire browser, should have been among these four. Although I must say, after I played around with it for a bit, I still like Dolphin better. Skyfire didn’t automatically recognize mobile plugins so often shows the pc site instead of the mobile one and I had some errors too. Still, pretty good browser!
Very curious about Firefox too!
The built-in browser has a problem with others? What did you have the Default browser set to?
I have to admit that my problem was the other way around: I want links to open using Dolphin, not the built-in. Once I set the default browser to Dolphin, that is what I got even when clicking links in other applications.
But from this experience, I would have expected that once you set the default to the built-in, then that should be the browser launched to view any link whether clicked in the built-in browser or any other application. It is, after all, done the same way, with an Intent and with Intent Filters.
Matt, I experienced that problem too, when I set Dolphin (or any browser) as default every link gets opened using that browser, even if you press “go” after a google search in another browser it opens the search query in the default one. Seems more like an error in the Android OS and how it handles default browsers?