Apple Tells Chrome Users to Switch to Safari: 35% Faster Pages and 5 More Hours of Video Claim

Apple is making a direct pitch to Chrome users on Mac. In a campaign covered by TechSpot on 15 October, Apple says Safari loads frequently visited sites up to 35% faster than Chrome and adds up to five extra hours of video streaming on one charge.

These are Apple’s own measurements, so here is what was tested and how to read it.

More on this topic: TechnoSports Safari coverage.

Key Details at a Glance

What Apple Tested

Apple ran its speed test on snapshot versions of 12 popular sites using 15-inch MacBook Air laptops with M5 chips and 16GB of memory, under simulated network conditions. The 35% figure applies to frequently visited sites in that setup.

Apple builds Safari’s WebKit engine and can tune it for its own chips, while Chrome uses a multi-process design that critics say uses a lot of memory.

How to Read the Numbers

The battery claim covers video streaming, a different workload from loading pages, and the speed claim covers a selected set of sites. Neither proves the same gain on every Mac, site or connection.

Independent tests would give a fuller picture. For now, the numbers are best treated as a marketing claim from the browser’s maker.

Chrome vs Safari: The Trade-offs

StatCounter puts Chrome at 66.36% of the browser market and Safari at 18.27%. Chrome’s strengths are its extension library and sync across Windows and Android, while Safari offers tighter Apple integration and privacy defaults.

TechSpot also notes criticism of Google for downloading a 4GB Gemini Nano model automatically, which is separate from Apple’s test. See our Safari coverage.

Who Should Switch?

If you only use a Mac and iPhone and care about battery life, a trial of Safari is easy, since it is already installed. If you rely on Chrome extensions or switch between Windows, Android and Mac, switching may cost more than it saves.

You can keep both browsers installed and compare battery and speed on your own work.

Quick Answers

How much faster does Apple say Safari is?

Up to 35% faster than Chrome for frequently visited sites on macOS.

What is the battery claim?

Up to five extra hours of video streaming on a single charge.

Are these independent results?

No, they are Apple’s own tests.

Source: TechSpot, Safari on Wikipedia, Google Chrome on Wikipedia.

A Quick Way to Test It Yourself

Run both browsers on the same Mac for a week. Use Safari for streaming and Chrome for the sites you visit most, then check battery usage in macOS settings. This tells you more than any vendor test on a different machine.

Also check that your must-have extensions, password manager and sync tools exist in Safari before you move over. If they do, the switch is easy to try and easy to reverse.