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> Then Chrome won when it was significantly than Firefox in ways lots of people cared about (it was fast and if a tab crashed the whole browser didn’t crash wit

> Then Chrome won when it was significantly than Firefox in ways lots of people cared about (it was fast and if a tab crashed the whole browser didn’t crash with it). Firefox shill here. I believe Chrome won because 1) Firefox had long been struggling with RAM consumption and stability 2) Chrome's onboarding was closer to effortless 3) It was relentlessly marketed/placed to saturation. Chrome had it's own RAM issues but #3 outweighed that. Any lock-in Chrome now has is due to A) #3, B) a better sync process that's integrated with Gmail and C) better corporate deployment (Gmail+Chrome). I've had my corp customers on Chrome over Firefox by about 4 to 1. I'm not happy about that but I have to prioritize their experience. However, Firefox has drastically improved in stability (as has Chrome). Chrome is getting less friendly. Where syncing isn't used, I see paths to swap users over the next year or so.

FoodWThrow 3y ago
> I believe Chrome won because 4) Chrome was faster, more responsive, and more stable than Firefox since its inception. Firefox reached parity *9* years later, with Firefox Quantum.
zztop44 3y ago
I agree that Chrome’s lock-in now is around syncing/integration. And, of course, the marketing. Firefox is now totally competitive on speed/stability. But it’s not a significantly better browsing experience, which is what it would need to be in order to overcome inertia and get people to switch. PS: My memory is that Firefox’s RAM issues were pretty awful when Chrome launched (if you had many tabs open it was only a matter of time until the browser crashed). Chrome was a significant improvement in that regard (and Google’s reputation was very good at the time, which probably helped).