Browser Speed Tests: Safari 5, Firefox 3.6, Chrome 6, and Opera 10.6 Beta

Browser Speed Tests: Safari 5, Firefox 3.6, Chrome 6, and Opera 10.6 Beta Apple's stepped up with Safari 5, Firefox has brought forth a more crash-proof 3.6, and Opera's continuing to push forward in betas. Let's break out the timer and testing software to see how the latest browsers run on real hardware.

Update: We've detailed our browser testing methods on a dedicated page, for those unfamiliar with the semi-standard procedures. Everyone else can skip to the results and pretty primary color graphs.

One important change to the charts this time around: we highlighted the winner, or winners, in green, for an easy visual orientation of whether you're looking at a "less is better" or "more is better" graph. Click any of the images below for a larger, wider view.

Boot-Up and Warm Loading—Winner: Opera 10.6 Beta!

Not a huge surprise, as Opera's 10.5 pre-alpha took the prize for cold start-ups last time. It's probably the most variable of the tests in this series, given the mysteries of hard drives, CPUs, and Windows app management—but Opera consistently starts up the fastest from a dead stop. The "warm" starts, after having run each browser once, are close enough together that Chrome's win there is notable, but not the decider.

Tab Loading—Winner: Internet—Wait, Seriously?—Explorer 8

Yes, I re-ran this test about three times. But, looking back two tests ago, I realize that Internet Explorer 8 was never a slouch in quickly pulling up content, even when hit with nine tabs at once. In this case, it was a home page for each browser tested, plus Google.com, Lifehacker and Gizmodo, and Hulu. Internet Explorer did quite well.

The other surprise that I couldn't shake after multiple tests? Safari 5 on Windows just would not load up all my tabs at once. It would load the top navigation bars from Lifehacker, Gizmodo, and Hulu, then freeze, with spinning dials on each tab for at least a minute. At least one other user saw similar multi-tab problems. It's not as though browser users are regularly loading up nine tabs at once, but it's still odd to see such an error.

JavaScript—Winner: Chrome (Dev Version)!

Last time, Opera jumped way, way out in the lead, but Chrome's development version picks up the top spot in the Dromaeo tests this time. The drop-off of Opera likely says something about the niggling details of JavaScript testing.

DOM/CSS—Winner: Opera 10.6 Beta!

Safari, Chrome, and Opera could be called evenly matched, given the variables of hardware and testing. Still, Opera's recent obsession with speed is starting to show returns.

Memory Use Without Extensions—Winner: Firefox 3.6!

It's a consistent result lately—with nothing installed, and having just been started, Firefox is really frugal with memory.

Memory Use with Extensions—Winner: Firefox 3.6!

Even though Firefox's extensions would seem to be more full-featured and memory-intensive than Chrome's, which seem to run like advanced user scripts, Firefox is better with a few standard extensions on memory than Chrome. Those extensions, by the way, are the same as in our last test: AdBlock Plus, Xmarks, LastPass, CoolIris, and a Gmail checker.

Here's a full comparison chart, showing each browser with and without extensions, with just one home page open and nine tabs loaded:

The Scores

As you can see, each browser has its strengths—even the most maligned browser in recent history. We took each of the five all-browser tests—start-up times, nine-tab loading, JavaScript, DOM/CSS, and memory use—and assigned a ranking to each contender. In the case of very close results, we assigned a "tie." In two cases—Internet Explorer on JavaScript and CSS, Safari on nine-tab loading—we had to assign zeros, though, obviously, each browser can perform those functions, but that's how it goes.

Here's how the browsers fared, in sum total:

Chrome (stable): 22
Chrome (dev): 20
Firefox: 18
Opera: 20
Safari: 14
Internet Explorer: 9

There you go—our latest batch of words and spreadsheet voodoo. We learned that Chrome is still pretty far ahead in JavaScript, but Opera is still a serious contender in overall scripting speed. We also saw that Internet Explorer has its strong points, and that Safari 5 on Windows is ... just as good as Safari on Windows has usually fared. And while Google Chrome's development version is usually the speedy trailblazer, we're wondering if the focus on features lately—syncing, built-in features, and the like—is why the stable branch feels just as fast lately, or if something else is at play deep in the code.

Don't see the truth in our results? Done some testing of your own? We welcome all kinds of debate in the comments.