When comparing Iridium Browser vs SRWare Iron, the Slant community recommends Iridium Browser for most people. In the question“What are the best desktop web browsers?” Iridium Browser is ranked 13th while SRWare Iron is ranked 50th. The most important reason people chose Iridium Browser is:
* Disable "Use a web service to help resolve navigation errors" * Disable autocomplete through prediction service when typing in Omnibox * Always send "Do-Not-Track" header * Network/DNS prediction is disabled by default * Block third-party cookies by default * Link auditing (<a ping="...">) is disabled by default * Fetch plugins list from iridiumbrowser.de where it will be updated regularly * Site data (cookies, local storage, etc.) is only kept until exit, by default * Passwords are not stored by default * Input form autofill is disabled by default * For IPv6 probes, use a DNS root server instead of Google * The default search provider is Qwant * Load "about:blank" on new tabs instead of the currently set search engine and/or promotions. * Don't report Safe Browsing overrides. * Don't use autofill download service. * Disable cookies for safebrowsing background requests. * Disable the battery status API.
Specs
Ranked in these QuestionsQuestion Ranking
Pros
Pro Privacy enhancements over Chromium
- Disable "Use a web service to help resolve navigation errors"
- Disable autocomplete through prediction service when typing in Omnibox
- Always send "Do-Not-Track" header
- Network/DNS prediction is disabled by default
- Block third-party cookies by default
- Link auditing (<a ping="...">) is disabled by default
- Fetch plugins list from iridiumbrowser.de where it will be updated regularly
- Site data (cookies, local storage, etc.) is only kept until exit, by default
- Passwords are not stored by default
- Input form autofill is disabled by default
- For IPv6 probes, use a DNS root server instead of Google
- The default search provider is Qwant
- Load "about:blank" on new tabs instead of the currently set search engine and/or promotions.
- Don't report Safe Browsing overrides.
- Don't use autofill download service.
- Disable cookies for safebrowsing background requests.
- Disable the battery status API.
Pro Lots of extensions available
Due to access to the Chrome Web store.
Pro Extensions are updated manually
They won't update automatically in the background.
Pro BSD license
You are in control and you can do almost anything with the code.
Pro Simple installation
Provides installers and packages for the most operating systems and linux distributions.
Pro Security improvements over Chromium
- Increase RSA keysize to 2048 bits for self-signed certificates (used by WebRTC)
- Generate a new WebRTC identity for each connection instead of reusing identities for 30 days
- Generate a new ECDHE keypair for each WebRTC connection instead of reusing them for multiple connections
- Disable using system-provided plugins (i.e. Java, Flash, etc.)
Pro Fast
It is fast since all background services have been disabled or removed.
Pro Disabled features
- Disable background mode
- Disable EV certificates, so they are shown just like "normal" certificates
- Disable Google cloud printing
- Disable Google hot word detection
- Disable Google experiments status check
- Disable Google translation service
- Disable Google promotion fetching
- Disable Google Cloud Messaging (GCM) status check
- Disable Google Now
- Disable automatic update check
- Disable profile-import on first run
Pro Based on Chromium
Supports all the modern web features.
Pro No useless bloating garbage
For example, no crypto, embedded blockers, spyware, or ads.
Pro Faster than US, Chinese or Russian products
Pro Can extend privacy configuration by extensions
With right extensions well configurated can be at high privacy level, even better than Brave, because it doesn't have its bloatware.
Recommended: uBlockOrigin + uMatrix + Trace + Font Fingerprint Protection.
Pro Is really and 100% European
Cons
Con Slow updates
Since the whole Chromium Release need to be scanned, PC users may wait half a year while the Chrome base gets updated five or six iterations.
Con Buggy
Sometimes, removing extensions won't work. Some websites downright refuse to load, no matter the settings.
Con Extensions MUST be updated manually
Con Poor debian support
current versions miss support for debian-based distributions which is by far the most widely used group of linux distributions.
Con Definitive unique browsing-fingerprint
Con Google Safebrowsing enabled by default
Con Based on Chromium
Since iridium is based off chrome, it is depend on all of Google's decisions.
Con Not keeping user settings, very unstabile, posible backdoor behaviour
After any browsing session after you exit the app and use a cleaner tool [CCleaner or other] when you start the browser next time, all setting inclusive search engine and security-privacy related is reverted to default... I tested for 2 weeks and don't find any other cause than that is from app internal, is programmed deep in core scripts.
