When comparing Slimjet vs GNU IceCat, the Slant community recommends GNU IceCat for most people. In the question“What are the best desktop web browsers?” GNU IceCat is ranked 8th while Slimjet is ranked 60th.
Specs
Ranked in these QuestionsQuestion Ranking
Pros
Pro Fast and stable
Lower memory footprint and CPU usage than Chromium.
Pro Built-in adblock
Supports adding lists in ublock, adblock, adblockplus, and peerblock/peerguardian text formats.
Pro Allows for no tracking
Has advanced settings to reduce web presence footprint.
Pro Built-in download manager
Multi-threaded streaming download manager with resume functionality. Interrupted downloads will resume when the program is launched again; number of threads and download location customizable on a per-download basis. Actually downloads Linux ISO's from most popular distributions faster than deluge, utorrent, transmission, etc.
Pro Still compatible with Google's ChromeSync functionality
Sign in to back up your extensions and settings, just like always.
Pro Notes plugin available
Pro Easily customize to stop spying verified by OpenSnitch
Just have to dig into all the Settings and disable them starting with SlimJet search.
Pro Customizable options to add additional buttons next to the address bar
Optional buttons such as go to home page, reopen closed tab, go to downloads, go to history and many more.
Pro Built-in Youtube/html5/flash downloader
Allows for downloading both video and extracted mp3 audio, a la Youtube2mp3.
Pro Cross-platform, with zipped portable application available for Windows
You can still bring it with you on a flash drive, even when you're not on Linux.
Pro Screen recording tools built in
Pro Separate from Google's servers and tracking
Pro Integrated shopping and share-to-social-media function
Button is linked to cookies, so doesn't work if signed out (for security/privacy), and also doesn't include any additional tracking like a browser extension would (Facebook, Amazon, etc.)
Pro Verbose resource management
Has a setting to unload tabs from RAM and CPU usage after a customizable threshold number of tabs are open built in.
Pro Idle tab unloading and other advanced features not found in Chrome/Chromium
A lot more configuration options for everything from built in "share to facebook" buttons to options meant to enable optimization on low powered/low RAM systems.
Pro All the benefits of Firefox, but with 100% free software
Pro LibreJS
LibreJS blocks proprietary JavaScript code, ensuring your user freedom.
Pro Protects your freedom, certified free by the FSF
Pro Extra security and privacy features
Pro Made by idealists
It is part of the GNU Project.
Pro No spyware
Pro Https-Everywhere by default
Pro SpyBlock
Blocks privacy trackers.
Cons
Con Still based upon Chromium/Chrome
Can yield to bloat if clogged with too many plugins and apps from the webstore.
Con Has some CSS issues on some websites
Has problems loading Sourceforge.com
Con Stores your history/settings into google servers
Con It spies on you
Con Too much bloat
The browser comes with 15 addons installed by default, most of which are useless or ruin one's browsing experience.
Con Mainly just an old Firefox
It is mainly a renamend older version of Firefox that comes preinstalled with some extensions.
Con Not up to date
Latest binary is still version 60.7 ESR and was last updated over a year ago
Con Requires too much unnecessary configuration to use
You have to manually delete all the bloated addons from your files (only for them to show up again when the browser is updated) and manually install some addons and themes that the browser labels as "corrupt".
Con Very slow boot time
It takes 10+ seconds for the browser to load up
Con Can't install some Firefox themes/addons
"Installation aborted because the addon appears to be corrupt".
Con Includes LibreJS by default with no way to remove it
Con Very slow boot time
It takes 10+ seconds for the browser to load up
Con Dependent on Mozilla
Since IceCat is based off Firefox, it's dependent on all of Mozilla's decisions.
Con Made by idealists
It is part of the GNU Project.
