Opera used to be a fantastic web browser, with a custom high-performance Presto rendering engine and features like tabbed windows that didn't show up in competing browsers until years later. However, the modern Opera browser is a shadow of its former self, reliant on chasing trends and meme advertis...
It should be held back. Although I dislike the company, I believe safari's market share and use of an alternative browser engine is important in keeping google from closing the web.
furthermore, they add nonstandard features to their browser(along with chrome), which makes it difficult to make websites look the same across browsers.
fortunately, I can test those websites beforehand since we have webkit-based epiphany on GNU/Linux(the engine which safari uses).
but other developers, especially those who are on windows can't, since safari is mac-only.
I have a special stylesheet to fix safari(and chrome) styling.
otherwise it's a fine lightweight browser(blessed be KHTML).
I think there are some better alternatives out there such as Firefox + uBlock Origin extension, Brave, Vivaldi (maybe Arc? Haven't tried it yet) that gives you some extra features that are missing in safari (for example Multi-account containers, vertical tabs, split tabs,... just to mention the ones I enjoy the most)
But if you just want a browser that works from a normal usage I don't see nothing wrong in using Safari.
+it uses an engine different from Blink (aka Chromium) which keeps a little bit of variety in the browser engine market. So while using Safari you're also doing something good for the internet imho
My biggest attachment to Safari is how well integrated it is with the rest of the Mac. Fingerprint integration for passwords, gesture integration with the track pad, seamless handoff between phone and computer—these things are somewhat reproducible with Firefox and extensions, but it is nowhere near as perfect as it is when you’ve got the browser and the whole OS designed to work in a coordinated dance with each other.
Hard to disagree with that... the flawless integration of every piece in Apple's "ecosystem" is hard to reproduce (even if all those features can be achieved as you were saying, it wouldn't be "as flawless")
Just maybe pair it with an Ad and Tracker blocker extension like AdGuard
Apparently There is beef between apple and google, and google won’t allow you to watch content in 4K on their video players (say youtube) for newer chip like the M1. There is no sound explanation apart from being a petty org. So to be able to watch stuff in the resolution you like you need to enable dev mode and add “experimental features” and some arent even on after that. Ask me why apple doesn’t battle it? I didn’t care enough to find out at that point, they’re both assholes fighting but the users pay. I simply switched to firefox on macbook pro and i can actually use a retina to its full potential. Can enable 4K there on video players with no hassle.