I think Google Chrome is a great browser and I use it on a regular basis. At the moment, I think their built-in developer tools are superior to those in Mozilla Firefox and the process sandboxing works better. That said, Firefox has the killer Awesomebar which kicks Google’s Omnibar out of the water and the ecosystem of extensions is a strong card for Mozilla. In my opinion these two browsers, which are the common choices for people especially in tech, are head-to-head when it comes to features.

How about performance then? When Chrome began to overtake Firefox, performance was one of they key reasons that made people switch. Its Javascript engine was much faster and the browser consumed less memory. Since then things have evened out. Chrome started a speed war which was great for users, since it forced the other major browsers to follow suit. The same has been true for memory and start-up times, though perhaps more quitely. Lifehacker’s latest browser test (June 12, 2012) revealed that Chrome is still kicking ass on the JS side, where as Firefox leads the way in memory and tab-loding.

As you see, I consider Firefox and Chrome to be more or less equal when it comes down to features and performance (and I could very well add Opera and Safari to the list). That brings me to the idea behind the browser, what drives the development.

I believe the Internet should be free and open, and because of that I prefer to support a browser whose only interest is promoting a free and open web. Can we so easily separate the tool from the idea? Can we really trust that commercial interests in the browser market will not spill over and influence the web? My answer would be no, because it is only reasonable that Google’s bottom line is an important factor in the future development of Chrome.

That is why I choose Firefox.