I switched to Arc, here is why

[francesco2015]

Hi everyone,

I want to share my recent decision to switch from Vivaldi to Arc, and it's important to clarify that this isn't a rant but rather an account of my experience.

Over the past couple of months, Vivaldi's stability significantly deteriorated. Initially, the browser struggled with memory management, constantly allocating memory without releasing it, necessitating frequent restarts. Subsequently, it began losing stack names, and eventually, it reached a point where it couldn't play videos with multiple tabs open. The video players would simply stop working across various websites, unaffected by attempts to refresh or reopen tabs. Having used Vivaldi for three years, I found it acceptable, if not outstanding, offering a better experience than Chrome mainly due to its customizable themes and superior tab management. However, recent issues suggest the Vivaldi team is facing significant challenges with regression and overall quality assurance.

In search of alternatives, I first tried Safari. While not entirely disappointing, Safari lacked the intuitiveness I preferred; features like Spaces and profile management were notably absent. Despite my efforts to organise my extensive tab collection into groups, the experience felt cluttered. Additionally, I encountered performance issues with the ad blocker AdGuard, and Safari generally ran slower on my MacBook Pro 14 compared to Vivaldi. Even though I loved the TouchID integration and the convenient preview of tab groups.

Still unsatisfied, I turned to Arc, a browser I had installed but never really explored. My experience with Arc was remarkably positive. Its Spaces feature excellently organises a large number of open tabs into virtual folders using AI, automatically grouping related tabs, such as those about football, into one folder. The ability to customise themes, maintain separate bookmarks for each space, and the intuitive shortcuts, including configurable routing (a feature less user-friendly in Vivaldi), significantly enhanced my browsing experience.

For those who, like me, prioritise efficient tab management and might not utilise Vivaldi's additional features like the email client, Arc presents a compelling, modern alternative. Vivaldi served me well enough for a while, but Arc is truly on another level.

[Ayespy]

@francesco2015 said in I switched to Arc, here is why:

recent issues suggest the Vivaldi team is facing significant challenges with regression and overall quality assurance.

I don't find this at all true on Windows or Linux, but Mac is devilishly hard to develop for, and over the last nine years, Vivaldi has run through a couple of rough patches like this on Mac. It's really hard to avoid.

[OakdaleFTL]

Note: Arc requires macOS 12 or higher...

[Ayespy]

Whereas Vivaldi will install and run on macOS Catalina 10.15 or newer...

[OakdaleFTL]

@Ayespy ...till October, I'm told...

[jimfbk55]

Thanks for the interesting post. I too have tried Arc and I also love it. It's blindingly fast and I love how one doesn't have to constantly cleanup tabs. My reservations about Arc have to do with backup. Since Arc doesn't currently save Spaces (except via Sync, which I don't trust), I'm quite nervous about relying on it. If they would add export/import of settings including Spaces, I'd feel a lot more comfortable relying on it.

I haven't had the bad experiences you've had with VivaldiMac (MacBook Pro 16 M1 Max). It's definitely not as zippy as Arc, but feels quite solid to me. Also, third party extensions work in Vivaldi and not all of them do in Arc (and the Arc address bar is too short so I can't make out the extension icons clearly).

So, I'm using both at the moment and I enjoy each of them for different reasons.

[thebusinessace]

After having Vivaldi consistently crash in the middle of work on a totally brand new computer with excellent specs - and getting the email to try out Arc on Windows today - in just a few hours of using both - Arc can keep up with the workload, while Vivaldi crashed twice again.

I love the features of Vivaldi, but I can't for the life of my understand why it gets so bloated despite hibernating everything, clearing out cache, removing unused extensions (only 2 - external password manager, and Toby, because I can't use Vivaldi Workspaces because it crashes and looses things too often).

I'm bummed to say it - but I have a feeling I'm going to be moving my Workload to Arc, if not everything.

[planetcall]

I have also used Vivaldi for the past three years. I have been happy with the workflow I have. The caveat is that almost all the tab management features are built with the mindset that the tabs are always in the top row. The tab stacking UI is way better when the tabs are horizontal than vertical in vivaldi. It makes me not use the stacking feature which otherwise I find very useful while using Edge or Arc. In the past year, I have seen Vivaldi performance deterioriate with bugs causing crashes or other random issues. I use both Mac and Windows and want a proper replacement for Vivaldi. I think Arc could be the next browser of choice for me.

[TravellinBob]

Well, I've said it before and I'll say it again. The more complex your set up, the more features you use, the more tabs you leave open - the more likely you are to have problems, no matter which browser you use. Complaining about it and getting impatient can't really make an immediate difference because I have no doubt the team are working on a ton of development stuff as well as problem solving. The same as the development teams for most browsers, I guess.

It's easy for me to say that, because as a retiree I don't need a ton of fancy stuff to play with so can get away with a plain vanilla set up that never ever crashes - most of the reports I see on the Forum I have never experienced or perhaps wouldn't even recognise! But I do recognise my case is different to most others.....

Vivaldi is fine for me and I have no need or desire to change - I've had enough of that stuff. One of the benefits of getting old I guess!

[Pathduck]

@TravellinBob I guess the people who talk about "workflows" are the real power users who use the browser for actual work instead of just browsing cat pictures and hanging out on forums like us plebs

They are also the same people who accumulate a gazillion tabs apparently

[wazul]

I avoided Chrome for the past 3 years and completely switched to Edge. When Arc beta was announced for Windows, I opted in and started using it.

From a UX perspective, Arc is amazing, although I won't delve into the details. However, even with the stable release, Arc for Windows has fatal flaws:

It is still clunky (e.g., when I try to pause a YouTube video, it takes at least 5-10 seconds) and buggy.
Arc on Windows lacks AI sorting and search capabilities.
While I appreciate Arc's UX, I couldn't bear the slow crappy browsing experience, so I switched to Vivaldi a day ago, since this is the only browser with better vertical tabs exp. Behold my Vivaldi setup:

[Ayespy]

@Pathduck Are you trying to say I'm a "power user?" Vivaldi is, after all, my office

[Pathduck]

@Ayespy The question is, have you ever used the term "work flow" to describe using a software product? If so you are a "power user"

[Ayespy]

@Pathduck I fear that I actually have. I have used it to describe why Vivaldi is the only browser I've ever found that satisfies my needs, after the loss of the old classic Opera.

That said, I have never referred to myself as a "power user." The only people I've seen do that are ones that routinely abuse their browser in strange and fantastical ways, such as continually creating new bookmarks until they have tens of thousands of them, keeping hundreds or thousands of tabs open, storing and continually referring back to years of history, and other habits that seem to me to betray some form of mental disorganization or compulsiveness. They are superior human beings, you see, and Vivaldi is bad for failing to cater to their "elite" needs.

(Just sayin'...)

[Pathduck]

@Ayespy Yep, those users.

"My workflow is bookmarking every single article I visit, and I need to save history for ever in case I forget I some site I visited three years ago..."

[Ayespy]

@Pathduck I, on the other hand, am not a "power" anything. I am merely a humble business owner who uses email and browser to perform my work and serve my list of clients. So my needs are simple. My clients are wealthy and important people, who make tons of money and get mentions in the press for their accomplishments, but I'm just a dude with a keyboard, a monitor, an internet connection, and a browser that minimizes the friction in my "work flow."

[Lefthandbass59]

@Ayespy said in I switched to Arc, here is why:

Whereas Vivaldi will install and run on macOS Catalina 10.15 or newer...

@OakdaleFTL said in I switched to Arc, here is why:

@Ayespy ...till October, I'm told...

Oh...
My Macbook won't update beyond 10.15 and the main reason I am looking at Vivaldi is that the latest version of Safari that I can use fails to render a couple of sites that I regularly visit.
Does that mean my current solution is only temporary?

[OakdaleFTL]

@Lefthandbass59 Sad to say, everything is only temporary... But, yes, when Chromium Project reaches a certain point, support for OS X 10.15.7 will be discontinued. An since Vivaldi is Chromium-based, that means Vivaldi support will also end... As I said, I've heard sometime in October.

There are patches out there for our Macs which I'll try when the time comes... I'll let you know how it goes!

[Lefthandbass59]

@OakdaleFTL Thank you.

[OakdaleFTL]

@Lefthandbass59 If it's any consolation, I have a PowerPC laptop running Panther (OS X 3.7...) that long ago became "unsupported" that still runs fine and looks gorgeous! But it won't run a modern browser, and those that run won't really surf the modern web...
This is a machine that I'd take to the park or on road trip. But, alas, it's not up to most everyday tasks... And my phone does most if not all it used to do!

(There was never PowerPC version of Vivaldi released... )