When comparing Brave vs Opera GX, the Slant community recommends Brave for most people. In the question“What are the best desktop web browsers?” Brave is ranked 9th while Opera GX is ranked 35th. The most important reason people chose Brave is:
Released to the community under the Mozilla Public License (MPL), this software respect the FSF's four freedoms, including the freedom to use, modify, and redistribute with or without modification freely.
Specs
Ranked in these QuestionsQuestion Ranking
Pros
Pro Free/libre software
Released to the community under the Mozilla Public License (MPL), this software respect the FSF's four freedoms, including the freedom to use, modify, and redistribute with or without modification freely.
Pro Option to disable additional privacy concerns
Like fingerprint tracking.
Pro Takes care of privacy and security
Takes privacy seriously by blocking ads and trackers and not tracking people's searches. Things like HTTPS everywhere and no tracking are standard with Brave. In most other browsers, things like these are optional at best.
Pro Built-in adblocking
Other apps make it difficult to block ads without rooting your phone or going through unoptimized add-on stores, but Link Bubble blocks them out of the box, making browsing much less crowded. Contains an optional "Allow Brave Acceptable Ads" So you can support the site you truly enjoy.
Pro Optional feature for you to get reimbursed for viewing ads
Basic Attention Token; you can decide to opt into a new blockchain-based digital advertising system, giving publishers a better deal and users a share of the ad revenue for their attention.
Pro Now supports Chrome Webstore
It's now a faster, less intrusive Chrome.
Pro Tor is available right in the browser
Private Window with Tor hides your IP address from the sites you visit.
Pro Faster than Google Chrome
Brave consistently beats Chrome in speed, might have to do with less tracking being run in the background.
Pro Very fast
The fastest browser out there.
Pro Sync is now available
Option to synchronize data between devices using peer-to-peer connections. No sign-in required, only a sync code.
Pro Option to pay supported sites based on view time percentage
Set up automatic micro-donations. Brave will automatically divide a monthly donation among the top sites you visit.
And/or, you can decide which sites get what percentage of your donation. It’s called pinning.
Pro Supports the latest technologies
Brave regularly adds new functionalities like decentralized domain support and a native crypto wallet long before Chrome considers them. These features to be disabled in settings.
Pro Developed by creator of Mozilla and Javascript
Pro Cross-platform Web Browser
Brave is available on Windows, Linux, macOS, Android, iOS
Pro Customizable
Browser is highly customizable, with dual colors, sounds, effects, bookmarks and tabs and much more.
Pro Built-in adblocker
Pro Built-in tracker blocker
Pro GX Control
Lets you limit the network traffic, RAM and CPU usage of the browser.
Pro Built-in messenger services
It has built-in Whatsapp, Telegram, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook Messenger and much more and this feature itself is better than most of the browsers out there.
Pro Built in music player
It has a built in music player which you can listen to Spotify, Youtube Music and Apple Music in the background.
Pro Very fast
Using the chromium engine, this browser is as fast as Chrome and Edge.
Pro Lots of Add-Ons
Opera Store and Chrome Store is available for this browser with millions of add-ons.
Pro It is good for gaming
Pro Opera Sync
You can sync everything via other devices and it is password protected apart from a standart login.
Pro Built-in news reader
Apart from other browsers like Edge which forces you to read only their feed, you can add any feed and news channel, and read them anytime.
Pro GX Cleaner
Lets you clean browser data easiliy.
Pro GX Corner
It's a page designed for game lovers with news, prices, deals and much more about the latest games.
Pro My Flow option
The browser has a built-in software which lets you send everything from files to pictures, and messages to yourselves via "My Flow" to your other devices and phones.
Pro Built in dark mode system
Pro Built-in VPN
It's a free service and unlimited (but it leaks your IP address). Perfect and very easy to use.
Pro Built in Ambient Music player and button sounds
The dynamic background music is an ambient downtempo that will immerse you further in your gaming-themed browser. Actively browsing, clicking and typing intensifies the music, for example, while slowly scrolling and reading will take the music down a notch. This dynamic reaction to your activity blends into the background when you’re in focus-mode, so you often don’t notice it until you miss it.
Also when you type via keyboard , a very nice click sound is there to feel like The Matrix computer engineer.
You can switch these sounds off.
Cons
Con Brave is an Ad company
Brave Software is a for-profit company (though users must opt into Brave ads and Brave doesn't track users.)
Con Download package is very large considering it as a browser
Brave takes on a lot of roles besides just browsing so it is understandably a larger file.
Con Useless built-in 'ad blocker'
Its adblocker is useless to be honest. Since the extension uBlock Origin is a great blocker by itself, the Brave ad blocker does not block every ad!
Con Quite intrusive advertisements, especially on Windows
Advertisements keep popping up in the Windows notification center. Must opt in to ad system, but no option to disable sound for ad notifications only.
Con Still dependent on Google
Since it's based on Chrome.
Con Uses much RAM
1 tab, 400+ RAM, also it depends on what website you're on.
Con Same security-holes as Chrome
On the desktop: Brave uses the same browser engine as Chrome, meaning it has the same security-holes as Chrome. Chrome is a big target for hackers (being the most popular browser in the world), and a webpage that will hack Chrome may also hack Brave.
However, Brave has security features that Chrome doesn't (such as a built-in adblocker). Those features will stop many hacking attempts.
Con Doesn't remove search engine ads
Con No reader view
Can be accessed with an extension though.
Con Dumbed down in the latest versions
In previous versions, Brave felt more like Firefox. Now it's been dumbed down, it feels more like Chrome/Chromium. For example: There's no menu-bar.
Con The iPhone version has some odd behavior
On reopening Brave, it often returns you to the "search results" page, rather than the webpage you had previously browsed to from the search results page. Might just be a specific configuration.
Con Cache dump
Doesn't clear cache well, shows same page even after emptying it until you ctrl+F5 to get fresh page every time you visit the page(s).
Con A browser for NFT-ers(?)
There would be less of a problem with using Web3 solutions if they weren't sometimes looking like an art for art's sake, a jerkcircle shoving down it's own topic down the users' throat. Replacing the Web 2.0 with another commercial solution is bound to end up as a reinvention of the wheel, where even more commercialization and direct monetization will push digital exclusion. Non-profit open source community has achieved great things while so far NFTs and cryptos are, not without a reason, ridiculed.
Con Sync issues
Unable to sync extensions, no cloud sync (only device sync).
Con Appearance
No options to customize apperance, and make the bookmarks appear on the home page, for instance.
Con Creator support limited
Most creators don't use it and so will not profit from the crypto system.
Con Poor Customer Support
Only customer support available in Brave community. Mods usually does not help.
Con Promotes search engines that track users such as Bing and Google
Google Search is the first search engine on the list.
Con Bookmark management
Bookmark management is not as seamless as other browsers.
Con No cloud sync like Firefox
Con Power hungry, uses much more battery power than other browsers
Per default Brave enables hardware acceleration which results in a much higher energy (battery) consumption than the most other web browsers.
Con Hypocritical/deceptive stance on privacy and advertisement
Brave is advertised as a browser that respects your privacy and blocks ads while still supporting content creators. However, at the same time the company is making deals with Facebook, Twitter and others to whitelist their trackers and ads
Con Bookmark button located on the left side of the URL bar and can't be moved
Con Owned by a Chinese consortium
Although it has many privacy and security features, Opera is owned by a Chinese company and everything you do online is spied by China probably.
Con GX Control not so effective
RAM, CPU and Network limiter is not so effective.
Con May not be for everyone
It's a gaming themed browser with dark and colorful interface. May not be everyones taste.
Con Opera GX for Android is bad
Slow.
Con Slow opening time
When compared to Edge, Chrome and Brave, this browser starts up a little later due to many features it has inside.
Con Practically spyware
Owned by a Chinese company.