There's a new web browser that everyone's talking about.
It's called Arc, and it was just released only for Mac and iOS.
It claims to be an operating system for the web that will usher in a whole new way of browsing.
I'm trying it, and it's pretty neat. But it does, however, face one big problem.
What web browser do you use? I normally use Google Chrome. Chrome?
Safari. Google Chrome, mostly Chrome. But are you willing to switch?
I mostly use Safari, though I've gone through my fair share
of browsers over the years. I remember when Firefox was new and gave us tabbed browsing.
I even had an Opera era because that was the fastest browser
for my crappy laptop at the time. Why?
Everything's integrated. Cross platform, if I have Windows PC, if I have Mac,
they all use Chrome. But Firefox is available cross platform?
It's not Google. If Firefox make a search engine that's good enough,
then I'll probably consider it. I want to use Firefox.
I really do. What do you use? You can. I know, but it's so much work.
It's so much effort to switch. It's the easiest to use between two different systems,
between Windows and Mac. You can have your favorite, your task bar.
Everything's shared in between them. It's just the syncing.
It's just the syncing, yeah. Because users don't need to pay up and buy a browser,
it should be really easy to switch around. And yet, few do.
Which is why I asked all my Mac-using colleagues to try ARC out.
I'm not interested. I only like Chrome. You Google's shill.
He's going to be missing out, because ARC is different enough to be worth trying.
Tabs and the address bar are on the left-hand side instead of the top.
This is especially welcome, since websites waste a lot of horizontal space these days.
I think it looks beautiful with the vibrant colors, themes, and margins.
That tab sidebar becomes a liability if you're the type to have
multiple small browser Windows open at a time. But look what happens when you put it into full screen mode.
You can take advantage of split screen to group two or more websites into one tab,
just like you can with macOS's full screen mode. Only this is a little more straightforward and convenient.
Plus, a lot of our computer life is spent in a web browser anyway.
And to keep you there, there's a built-in sketchpad and notepad,
which are treated just like any other tabs. What stands out to me
is that ARC has a different vision for browsing. You can set up profiles to divide your work
in personal life, and they're really easy to switch between.
But ARC will archive the tabs within profiles
after only 12 hours. Certainly surprised to open up your computer after a day
and find everything you were looking at missing. You have to go into history to get them back
or change the setting to 30 days, like I did. However, there's a well thought out process here.
Tabs you use all the time across profiles should be favorited as buttons at the top.
And tabs you wanna keep within profiles should get pinned up here.
Also, check out this tab layering.
Pretty neat. Outside the main browser window, there's mini ARC Windows,
which appear when you click on a web link from within a Mac app. I like how it helps contain and constrain
the web browsing outside of the main browser. If you can adapt to these paradigms,
maybe this could help you become more intentional about your browsing.
So does it. The main goal of it was to sort of clean up all your tabs
and have it be a bit more work focused, I guess you could say.
You can have a lot more things open at the same time, without having a bunch of clutter in your taskbar.
If I'm at work, I sort of have three to five websites
that I'm constantly using. So those are just the obvious ones. At home, I actually have a different workspace entirely.
So I use the space function. So that's just all the stuff that I generally just check
either in the morning or after work. I tried installing it on my phone,
but it required a desktop to install for some reason.
The phone version of ARC is interesting. I like its design a lot
because buttons feel like buttons, but it is wholly unfinished.
It syncs to your desktop surfing sessions via iCloud, letting you carry on from what you were looking at there.
However, you cannot contribute to it by adding a new tab.
Instead, you can only search in one temporary tab that's gone as soon as you swipe it down,
unless you pin it. I prefer on mobile over desktop.
Really? Cause you can't even like keep tabs in mobile. I'm really simple phone user.
So for like one tab is all I need. What else about the phone version makes it better than the desktop version for you?
The fact that you can change the theme and you can change the icon
that has cute little animations. At first I like it.
I really like the UI. I think it's pretty pretty and like design-wise I like it.
But then when I used it, I didn't like it as much
because it's just like Google Chrome, but more beautiful.
I have my own minor gripes too. The back button and address bar
are too small and insignificant relative to their importance to surfing.
But these are small things that wouldn't prevent me from switching.
Would you switch to ARC? I don't think so.
But you would still stick with Safari? Yes. Wow.
I'll try it out. I'm open to anything that will like make my life better.
Yeah, I kind of, as of now, I have like fully switched to ARC.
Yeah. Whoa, that's crazy. Yeah, it was really easy with all the importing
that it allows from Chrome. It just brings everything over. You just had to make an account,
sync everything up and it worked. What? Hold on a minute.
I wouldn't mind it on the PC. I'm kind of useful. So if ARC was available on the PC, then would you switch?
Yeah. The streamlined design like a Mac, but on the PC would be great.
I'm still quite indifferent to switching browsers. I go where the wind takes me.
I started using Safari full time because I cover Apple and that's the browser.
Apple made some big updates to Safari last year with tab groups and their own take on profiles.
But because Apple stuck in their flat design ways
and they built these features in a well-established interface, I found it difficult to incorporate them
into my surfing habits. I'm glad I'm giving ARC a try thanks to this video,
but does this mean I'm committing to an ARC era? I think I might just do it,
but there are two niggling problems, Google and the money.
ARC is built on Chromium, the free open source version of Google Chrome
available for developers to build their own browser on top of.
That means they all have the same engine and have all the same base features available.
Making it easy for Chromeers to switch over. Even Microsoft, who dominated the browser space 20 years ago
with Internet Explorer, has switched to their Chromium based edge.
Yet, it means that Google dominates in yet another layer of the web space
and I'm a little tired of it. Chromium may be open sourced,
but Google still has control over it. So even if you're not using Chrome,
the web is still being optimized for it in other parts of Google's business.
Like most other browsers, ARC is free. Free with Google means,
monetized with their advertising and surveillance, but ARC makes a big deal about not monetizing your data.
So they're still going to be looking for ways to earn money differently.
One way to monetization is ARC for teams
and saying, hey, if you're working at a company, how do we make it so the best way to work together
is in ARC with ARC together.
Kind of the way that Figma, Notion, Airtable, all these companies monetize.
I mean, it's really great. You give it away to individuals for free forever and then you charge their companies.
Exploring monetization strategies that break from the convention of us users
being the product is laudable, but would you or I pay for ARC?
Depends on the price. Thanks for browsing through this Mac Address.
If you surf the web, give this video a like. And if you surf the waves,
well then you might as well subscribe. I'm curious in the comments below what browser you currently use
and what eras you've had in the past. And would you try ARC?