A short while ago I was opposing’s Microsoft’s outrageous claims about IE8 versus the other browsers. Now, I come back with an updated result on the ACID 3 W3C standards compliance test:

Windows ACID 3 results:

• Chrome 4.0.249:  100% (and fast!).First run took 0.40 to complete! Yet the next one needed and average of 1.01 seconds.
• Internet Explorer 8.0.76: 12% (fail, poorly). Couldn’t even tell, failed basic tests like Javascript functions.
• Firefox 3.6: 96% (almost!). First run needed 0.73 seconds while the rest took an average of 1.41 seconds.
• Safari 4.0.4: 100% (but slow, seems to pause at 69% and then continue, definitely not “the fastest browser” as Apple claims!). First attempt took 4.10 seconds while the rest needed 1.41 seconds.
• Opera 10.10: 100% (fairly ok, better than Safari but slower than Chrome). First run took 1.51 seconds to complete but strange subsequent runs needed and average of 2.10 seconds.

Mac OS X ACID 3 results:

• Chrome 4.0.249: 100% (very fast!). First test was completed in 3.51 seconds and the rest averaged 1.80 seconds
• Firefox 3.6: 94% (even less!). Firefox finished in 2.86 seconds on the first run and average of 1.51 seconds on the subsequent runs. 4 of the failures were related to SVG graphics and two to DOM functions.
• Safari 4.0.4: 100% (but slow, seems to pause at 69% just like on windows!). First run finished in 7.2 seconds while the rest ran in 3.23 seconds (all of them, identically).
• Opera 10.10: 100% (interestingly, much faster than on windows). First test finished in 4 seconds, while the rest ran erratically with an average of 3.7, but sometimes taking as much as 5.2 seconds (and as less as 2.4 seconds).

What can we learn from here? Firefox 3.6 and Chrome 4 are fighting for the title of the fastest and the best browser. Personally, I think Firefox’s fails in the ACID 3 test are irrelevant to your daily browsing. SVG graphics are not that common in your usual websites so I’m willing to skip that.

Lately I’ve started to prefer the spartan default installation of Chrome as well as the fact that Chrome is much easier on memory than Firefox.

On the other hand, I’m having a hard time considering Safari a contender. Safari is slow by itself (not talking of rendering web pages) as an application and it is also full of useless eye candy (which are not even that nice). Of course, it’s good that it holds up to its goals and deals great with web standards, however its claim to be the fastest browser is not supported by reality.

Opera? Opera is nice. I like Opera. But aside from this, there’s nothing to support Opera in either directions. It’s a good browser and … that’s that. It doesn’t shine neither in speed, nor in looks or features.

Internet Explorer? Well, IE8 has come a long way to becoming a real browser, the closest thing Microsoft has come to that goal. However, it’s blatant lack of standards support (especially on the Javascript side) is unbearable and one of the reasons why Internet Explorer keeps losing supporters.

I keep stressing on web standards compliance and perhaps in a future article I will note why I consider this to be of paramount importance.