My World Thru A Web Browser: Web Browser Competition Winner: Firefox 9 (again)

Tom's Hardware Guide revisited their web browser competition for January 2012. Mozilla Firefox 9 again beat the competition. Results below.

In our last installment, Web Browser Grand Prix 7: Firefox 7, Chrome 14, Opera 11.51, we completely dropped the raw placing tables in favor of the analysis tables that more closely reflect the scale of victory. Let's quickly take a moment to go over what these mean.

The analysis tables hold categories for each type of benchmark. For example, Mozilla Dromaeo DOM is represented by the DOM category, while Peacekeeper, the Krakens, and SunSpiders are represented together under the JavaScript category.

Each category has four columns: winner, strong, acceptable, and weak. Winner is obviously the browser that achieves the highest scores for the category. The strong column is for those browsers exhibiting superior performance, but no victory. Acceptable is for browsers that perform neither spectacularly nor poorly, but merely adequately. For tests that measure frame rates, a score near the 30 FPS range gets that browser filed into the acceptable column. The weak column is for browsers that perform poorly or substantially lower than their competitors.

In the event of a complete tie in the analysis tables, we simply go back to the individual benchmarks and look at the raw difference in scores.

The Windows 7-based standings for Chrome 16, Firefox 9, Internet Explorer 9, Opera 11.60, and Safari 5.1.2 are found in the table below.

Windows 7 Analysis Table

	Winner	Strong	Acceptable	Weak
Performance Benchmarks
Startup Time, Light	Safari	Chrome, Firefox, Internet Explorer, Opera
Startup Time, Heavy	Internet Explorer	Chrome, Opera	Firefox	Safari
Page Load Time, Uncached	Chrome	Firefox, Internet Explorer, Opera, Safari
Page Load Time, Cached	Chrome	Safari	Firefox, Opera	Internet Explorer
JavaScript	Chrome	Firefox	Opera	Internet Explorer, Safari
DOM	Opera	Chrome, Firefox	Safari	Internet Explorer
CSS	Safari	Chrome	Internet Explorer, Opera	Firefox
Flash	Safari	Internet Explorer, Opera	Chrome, Firefox
Java	Firefox	Chrome	Internet Explorer, Opera, Safari
Silverlight	Opera		Firefox, Internet Explorer	Chrome, Safari
HTML5	Internet Explorer	Firefox	Chrome, Safari	Opera
HTML5 Hardware Acceleration	Internet Explorer	Firefox		Chrome, Opera, Safari
WebGL	Firefox		Chrome	Internet Explorer, Opera, Safari
Efficiency Benchmarks
Memory Usage, Light	Internet Explorer	Safari, Opera	Chrome, Firefox
Memory Usage, Heavy	Safari		Chrome, Firefox, Opera	Internet Explorer
Memory Management	Chrome	Internet Explorer	Firefox	Opera, Safari
Reliability Benchmarks
Proper Page Loads	Firefox, Opera	Safari	Chrome	Internet Explorer
Conformance Benchmarks
HTML5	Chrome	Firefox, Opera		Internet Explorer, Safari
JavaScript	Opera	Firefox	Chrome, Internet Explorer, Safari

Now let's see how Chrome 16, Firefox 9, Opera 11.60, and Safari 5.1.2 fare on the MacBook Air's native platform of Mac OS X.

Mac OS X (Lion) Analysis Table

	Winner	Strong	Acceptable	Weak
Performance Benchmarks
Startup Time, Light	Safari	Firefox	Chrome	Opera
Startup Time, Heavy	Firefox	Opera	Chrome, Safari
Page Load Time, Uncached	Chrome	Firefox	Safari	Opera
Page Load Time, Cached	Safari	Chrome	Firefox, Opera
JavaScript	Chrome	Firefox	Safari	Opera
DOM	Firefox	Chrome, Safari	Opera
CSS	Safari	Chrome	Opera	Firefox
Flash	Firefox		Chrome, Opera, Safari
Java	Opera		Safari	Chrome, Firefox
Silverlight	Safari			Chrome, Firefox, Opera
HTML5	Safari		Chrome, Opera	Firefox
HTML5 Hardware Acceleration	Safari			Chrome, Firefox, Opera
WebGL			Chrome, Firefox	Opera, Safari
Efficiency Benchmarks
Memory Usage, Light	Safari		Opera	Firefox, Chrome
Memory Usage, Heavy	Opera	Safari	Firefox	Chrome
Memory Management	Chrome			Firefox, Opera, Safari
Reliability Benchmarks
Proper Page Loads	Opera	Firefox	Chrome, Safari
Conformance Benchmarks
HTML5	Chrome	Firefox, Opera	Safari
JavaScript	Opera	Firefox	Chrome, Safari

Without further ado, let's crown our Web Browser Grand Prix VIII champions.

Web Browser Grand Prix Champion, The Windows Circuit

Although Firefox demonstrates the least number of wins (one less than IE9, Opera, and Safari, and two less than Chrome), it achieves the highest number of strong scores and only turns in one weak performance. Firefox 9 solidifies Mozilla's Web Browser Grand Prix championship, which was precariously handed out to Firefox 7 last September. Congratulations Mozilla! It's good to see that this browser war veteran still has some fight left in it.

Chrome 16 is still just a minor performance update away from matching or perhaps even surpassing Firefox 9 though, and the recent improvements to Firefox seem to have absolutely no effect on Google's march to the top of Web browser market share.

Opera is still hanging onto a strong third-place position with version 11.60, especially considering it still lacks HTML5 hardware acceleration and WebGL support. But Opera 12 is on the way, and it promises to seriously shake things up, just like the last two whole-number releases out of Norway.

Microsoft Internet Explorer has been stagnating for several months, and it's really starting to show. Last year, IE9 won two consecutive Web Browser Grand Prix championships and stayed near the top of the pack for some time afterward. The browser now resides at the bottom of the heap, tied for last place Apple's offering in Windows 7.

While the Windows version of Safari moved forward since our last look, the progress isn't enough to move the browser out of last place. In Windows 7, that is...

Web Browser Grand Prix Champion, The Mac OS X Circuit

Despite the best efforts of Google, Mozilla, and Opera, Apple Safari retains its OS X Web Browser Grand Prix crown. With a staggering number of wins and an equally impressive lack of weaknesses, Safari 5.1.2 simply owns on its native platform.

The OS X runner-up, on the other hand, is highly debatable. We're going call it in favor of incumbent number two, Google Chrome. Firefox 9 really pulled ahead from the last-place finish it received back in August, though.

Unfortunately, the Mac version of Opera is a mere shadow of its Windows version, landing the Norwegian powerhouse in last place.

Operating System Comparison

The red bars that occasionally appear in our charts denote when an OS X-based browser beats all of the Windows 7-based competition. We use the word occasionally because we only had to switch the Mac OS X green bars to red four times. That's four out of 35 eligible charts, as opposed to the 10 out of 29 OS X earned on the Hackintosh system we used in Web Browser Grand Prix VI: Firefox 6, Chrome 13, Mac OS X Lion. While many Mac fans expected to see OS X really hammer Windows 7 on a genuine Mac, the home court advantage didn't do Apple any favors.

So, Redmond wins yet another Mac versus PC Web Browser Grand Prix, this time on a mobile system (and a brand new Core i7-based MacBook, to boot). Ouch.

With the Firefox 10, Opera 12 and Internet Explorer 10 releases just around the corner, guys from TomsHardware have decided to test the latest stable builds of the top 5 web browsers on both Windows 7 and Mac OS X Lion.
How did your favorite web browser perform? Let’s find out.

Tested versions
Internet Explorer 9
Firefox 9
Google Chrome 16
Opera 11.60
Safari 5.1.2