Safari vs Edge 2024: review, features, pros and cons

Microsoft Edge is quickly becoming a serious contender for the “Default Browser” position that many people want. Even though Edge was designed to be the default browser for Windows 10, it works really well in macOS. We put the browsers up against each other in some important ways, and the results were a bit surprising.

Read on to find out not only which browser is better overall for Mac, but also which one might be better for your Mac in the future! Safari, Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, and Microsoft Edge are the most used browsers on macOS, and each has its own strengths. On macOS, here’s how the four compare.

The truth is that there is no perfect browser. Each of the four most popular macOS browsers has its own strengths and weaknesses. This is because the engines used to render websites are different, and the developers of the big-four have put different things at the top of their lists.

Even though the best browser for each person depends on how they use it and which websites work best on each browser, there are a number of benchmarking tools that can measure how well a browser does on fake tasks. A while ago, Microsoft Edge was just the web browser that came with Windows 10. After ditching the old EdgeHTML engine in favour of Chromium, it has finally started to get some serious traction. Microsoft Edge is now also available on the Mac, which is a bit of a surprise.

Safari works great on a Mac and lasts a long time on a single charge. But the fact that Microsoft Edge is based on the Chromium engine gives it an advantage when it comes to new places. Google Chrome uses the same browser engine, so Edge will be more compatible with the web if it uses Chromium.

Safari Features

Edge Features

Safari vs Edge Design

As you use your Mac, you’ll probably spend a lot of time staring at your internet browser. Because of this, it’s nice to have a browser that looks nice. Is there a browser with a more attractive design than Edge or Safari? We think that both look great and have user interfaces that are easy to pick up and use.

Safari uses a lot more icons, but it might be easier to look at them than Edge’s slightly less cluttered top menus. Safari also has a “Dark Mode,” which you can use if you like how it looks or want to turn it on at a certain time of day.

Edge looks and works a lot like Chrome, but it lets you change the way it looks in a few more ways. You can change Edge’s theme to change its entire color scheme, and every time you you can see a beautiful picture and some news articles.

When you in Safari, you can choose a picture to be the tab’s background. You won’t see headlines, but you will see your favorites, your most-visited pages, and a Privacy Report.

Safari vs Edge Organization

If you’re doing research online for something you want to buy or for work, it’s very helpful to have a browser that can help you keep track of everything. Safari and Microsoft Edge can both do that, but Edge does it a little better.

This is mostly because Edge has a feature called “Collections.” Instead of just saving important web pages as bookmarks, Edge lets you save them in groups you make, which are called Collections.

You could put together a list of gift ideas for someone and another list of places to visit. Then you could switch between them whenever you needed to. You could also make a Collection for a research project or for important websites you use a lot at work.

Sharing collections with other Edge users is a great way to work in groups and plan events. Edge also has hidden features, like the ability to pin tabs in a browser window so you never accidentally close an important resource and can always keep certain pages open when you open the browser. You can also arrange its tabs vertically if that makes it easier for you to keep track of them.

Safari vs Edge Data syncing

Safari is a great browser for syncing bookmarks and passwords between your iPhone and iPad through iCloud, but you can’t get it outside of the Apple ecosystem. So, it’s often nearly impossible to get to your data on other platforms. On Windows, you can only sync your Safari bookmarks with Chrome or Firefox. And yes, better forget Android altogether.

On the other hand, Microsoft Edge for the Mac is truly cross-platform. You can easily get to your browsing data (bookmarks, passwords, extensions, etc.) not only on the iPhone and iPad, but also on Windows and Android. You’ll need a Microsoft Account if you want to sync your Edge browsing data, but it’s very easy to set one up.

Safari vs Edge Extension Support

Apple stopped supporting legacy extensions in Safari for macOS starting with version 13. This was a bad move, at least in my opinion, even though there were privacy concerns. So, there aren’t many “supported extensions” right now. Also, most extensions that work with each other cost money to use in the first place. As a power user, I find it hard to recommend Safari for the Mac.

The new Microsoft Edge, on the other hand, has an impressive library of extensions that keeps growing. Just go to the Microsoft Edge Add-ons store and look around. You can find a lot of add-ons that can improve your shopping, social media, and other experiences, as well as make you much more productive. Even better, you can add extensions made for other Chromium browsers, like Google Chrome, to Microsoft Edge.

Safari vs Edge Performance

In addition to the things we have already mentioned, you should also think about whether Safari or Edge works better on a Mac. We think that each browser has different strengths in this way. A test on HTML5test.com for both Firefox and Safari and Edge shows that Edge is faster than both. It also has a built-in task manager that lets you close specific pages and processes to make it run faster and better on your Mac.

Apple says that Safari can stream for 1.5 hours longer and browse for up to 1 hour longer than Chrome and Firefox on a single charge. It’s a powerful browser on a Mac because it can stream in 4K and still has pretty fast speeds. This could be another draw category, but there’s something important to think about.

Since both Safari and Macs are made by Apple, Safari will always be made to work best on Macs. Edge has always been updated first on new PCs and then on other systems. So, you might get better performance in the long run from Safari that was made for Macs. But Edge is still faster right now, which may be a very important factor for you.

Safari Pros and Cons

Edge Pros and Cons

Which one should you consider?

Microsoft Edge is already the default browser for a lot of Mac users. After using and getting to know the browser on the Mac, they seem to love it. Even though Edge has become a nice browser, we found that it can’t beat Safari. There is a very good reason for it. Safari is the default browser on a Mac. It was made just for Mac to give users a complete experience.

Edge, on the other hand, doesn’t let you sync with other Apple devices, which is a big problem. Aside from all this, if you want to try something new, you should switch to Microsoft Edge. The Mac version of Edge is very well made, so it won’t let you down. And focused on giving people something they already knew.

FAQs

Is Edge better for Mac?

It is fast and responsive, works with all Chrome extensions, uses less RAM, and has Picture-in-Picture. It tastes great! Plus, Edge makes MUCH better use of the Touch Bar on MacBooks than Chrome does.

Does Edge consume more RAM?

The startup boost feature of Microsoft Edge lets the browser load some of its core processes before the system starts up. This makes the browser open faster when you want to browse on your Windows PC. But this can make Edge use more RAM and other system resources to load some things ahead of time.