02-26-2021, 10:42 PM
Like many of you, I have been struggling to find a working browser for Mobian. Chromium was the most usable — until it wasn't. Half the time, it doesn't even load for me and I just get a gray screen.
On desktop, I use Vivaldi exclusively, which I would argue is the best browser ever made. I never had luck installing it on Mobian, because I couldn't find it in the right architecture. Well, If you go over to 'old versions' on their website, you can find a new, stable version of Vivaldi for Arm64.
After you install it, I would recommend you disable all animations, clean up the interface, and maybe find a tutorial or two on how to speed up Vivaldi. I would also go to developer tools (f12), click the three dots in the upper right, then go to more tools, network conditions, and under 'user agent' uncheck 'Select Automatically'. Then set the user agent to Chrome, Android Mobile (high-end). Then restart. This will cause far fewer sites to deliver the full desktop version of their site when you're browsing.
I'm still getting some horizontal scrolling on some sites, but luckily, Vivaldi has a zoom slider right in the status bar, so it's easy to tweak sites on a case-by-case basis.
Vivaldi also has an integrated mail client and calendar now, and they also work on Mobian. I haven't spent too much time with these, but they display at the correct scale, unline Geary and Gnome Calendar.
On desktop, I use Vivaldi exclusively, which I would argue is the best browser ever made. I never had luck installing it on Mobian, because I couldn't find it in the right architecture. Well, If you go over to 'old versions' on their website, you can find a new, stable version of Vivaldi for Arm64.
After you install it, I would recommend you disable all animations, clean up the interface, and maybe find a tutorial or two on how to speed up Vivaldi. I would also go to developer tools (f12), click the three dots in the upper right, then go to more tools, network conditions, and under 'user agent' uncheck 'Select Automatically'. Then set the user agent to Chrome, Android Mobile (high-end). Then restart. This will cause far fewer sites to deliver the full desktop version of their site when you're browsing.
I'm still getting some horizontal scrolling on some sites, but luckily, Vivaldi has a zoom slider right in the status bar, so it's easy to tweak sites on a case-by-case basis.
Vivaldi also has an integrated mail client and calendar now, and they also work on Mobian. I haven't spent too much time with these, but they display at the correct scale, unline Geary and Gnome Calendar.