Internet explorer vs Mozilla Firefox vs Opera

There are several things to look for when you chose browser.

According to current survey, most of the people have spyware, though they are not aware of it. If you have anything below Windows XP SP2, using of Internet explorer is very risky, as you are likely to get viruses, spyware or trojans by browsing with it. Service pack 2 brought more security to Internet explorer, but it also opened several more vulnerabilities. It is still not known that there are viruses which attack Firefox and Opera.

Mozilla Firefox has the best pop-up blocker. Internet explorer with SP2 blocks most of the pop-ups and takes second place according to this criteria. Other pop-up blockers are much less efficient. If SP2 is not installed, Internet explorer doesn't have any blocker, and even by adding additional software is not competitive with Mozilla Firefox.

When speed is in question, Opera wins the battle, but Mozilla Firefox is just a little behind. They both load web pages significantly faster than Internet explorer. However, Internet explorer launches significantly faster than both programs.

The most full-featured browser without any additional software is Opera. However, some of the Opera's features appear to be the things many people don't need, so most people will find that Firefox is as full featured as Opera. Internet explorer falls behind those two, as its features were not updated within years.

The best user interface has Firefox. It is very simple and logical. With tons of features Opera appears cluttered and that is the main argument against it - it should be more easy and more pleasant to use. Some people might like a fancy interface effects, but if you are a serious user you will find that they are not ergonomic. Internet explorer doesn't have so many features comparing to other browsers, but it still looks much more complicated than it needs to be.

Firefox has around 500 extensions. Most of them are useful add-ons which are professionally developed and most of them don't affect stability of browser. Internet explorer also has significant number of extensions, but free extensions appear to be less professional and usually buggy, while commercial add-ons are good, but most of them are free for Firefox. There are extensions which add more features to Internet explorer, so that it becomes comparable to Opera or Firefox, but they have cluttered user interface, and most of them make Internet explorer unstable. Opera doesn't have many features that can be added this way. If you want to change the look of browser, Firefox and Opera are your choice, and you must forget about Internet explorer.

The most important argument to use Internet explorer is that some sites can be viewed only with it. I surf intensively, and I don't have such problems, but you might be visiting sites that require this, and then your choice is obvious.

Finally, Internet explorer is shipped with Windows, Mozilla Firefox is free to download, and you can download Opera for free, but it will show advertisements until you pay for it.

Taking all this into account, I recommend you to use Mozilla Firefox.