Seems they just want your personal browsing history for training, and built this Chromium reskin to get around privacy controls.
> "OpenAI decided to build its own browser, rather than simply a "plug-in" on top of another company's browser, in order to have more control over the data it can collect, one source said."
pzo 34 minutes ago [-]
I think native browser can provide better integration than browser extensions. Things like: mcp, access to accessibility, playwright, browser use, stagehand - this should help make a better operator.
conartist6 3 minutes ago [-]
Why do these idiot companies keep tackling real technical challenges that they don't want.
Open AI doesn't want to own and maintain a browser for the next 20 years! They'll give up in like two years when they realize it's actually quite hard and they have no particular committment to it
bradleyjg 38 minutes ago [-]
Strange how in the end KDE Konqueror beat out Netscape Navigator and Internet Explorer. No one would have believed it.
pjmlp 4 minutes ago [-]
Especially when ignoring that Blink has very little of it left.
danielbln 28 minutes ago [-]
The name was prescient. It conquered alright.
CuriouslyC 15 minutes ago [-]
At first I thought this was funny, but truthfully I don't love my browser. Brave and Firefox are both mildly annoying in different ways.
I'll probably give it a spin when they release it. It's just a Chromium fork and they can afford to make it good, if the AI integration is subtle and actually useful and there are robust controls on how my data is used (and it supports high quality adblock), I could see myself using it regularly.
rvnx 59 minutes ago [-]
Investors at Perplexity are now crying. Company is dead, killed by its supplier, like Cursor
jillesvangurp 47 minutes ago [-]
Why not just release this as an extension? And make it work with Firefox as well. This seems why browser extensions exist at all. No need to pretend that perplexity or openai is actually going to do any work at all on the rest of the browser. And it seems overkill to release your own browser just to white label it.
xnx 37 minutes ago [-]
IIRC most web use is mobile. Approximately 0% of mobile users can install extensions.
Edit: I forgot iOS Safari can install extensions. Android users can install Firefox and then install extensions, but this is a big ask for the typical user.
Probably still a good estimate that <0.5% of mobile users have ever installed an extension.
frizlab 35 minutes ago [-]
That’s absolutely untrue? On iOS extensions are supported, and I hope an android too!
xnx 29 minutes ago [-]
Good point. I forget about Safari extensions because iOS forbids other browser engines.
Chrome on Android does not support extensions (maybe in the future with manifest v3?), but Firefox does.
danielbln 29 minutes ago [-]
Not in Chrome, but definitely in Firefox.
_Algernon_ 28 minutes ago [-]
Everyone who has android can install Firefox and thus can install extensions. Last I checked the Android market share was nowhere close to 0%
xnx 24 minutes ago [-]
Yes, and that's great, but <1% of Android users use Firefox.
It's pretty much impossible to create WebExtensions that provide a complete experience and feel native. The API is (perhaps rightfully so) quite restrictive.
zer00eyz 25 minutes ago [-]
> The browser’s access to a user’s web activity would make it the ideal platform for AI “agents” that can take actions on their behalf, like booking reservations or filling out forms, directly within the websites they use.
How about agents canceling services I no longer want? Or agents figuring out what choices I have to make to get my return picked up rather than have to take it to a drop off or pay?
There was the open web, with lots of rich api's... All of that got killed for the sake of profit and market consolidation. Are those same players going to be tolerant of agents cutting into their bottom line, of agents that cant be upsold, that dont misclick?
IF we ever get a solid agenic tooling I suspect that it will be murdered in its crib by industry.
It would be a shame if YouTube/Maps/Google/etc. suddenly would not work properly or fast on this browser...
rvnx 52 minutes ago [-]
They will work, in order to increase retention, just that Google will have to pay billions to be default search engine instead of OpenAI
pjmlp 5 minutes ago [-]
Another reskin, I rather have the original one.
coffeebeqn 1 hours ago [-]
I’m assuming this is some kind of a layer on top of chromium?
ethan_smith 32 minutes ago [-]
Almost certainly a Chromium fork rather than just a layer, similar to how Edge, Brave and Arc are built. This gives them full control over the rendering engine and browser internals while leveraging Chromium's compatibility.
WJW 59 minutes ago [-]
It literally says that in TFA.
yahoozoo 7 minutes ago [-]
Is this the next step towards AGI?
57 minutes ago [-]
Rendered at 11:37:24 GMT+0000 (Coordinated Universal Time) with Vercel.
> "OpenAI decided to build its own browser, rather than simply a "plug-in" on top of another company's browser, in order to have more control over the data it can collect, one source said."
Open AI doesn't want to own and maintain a browser for the next 20 years! They'll give up in like two years when they realize it's actually quite hard and they have no particular committment to it
I'll probably give it a spin when they release it. It's just a Chromium fork and they can afford to make it good, if the AI integration is subtle and actually useful and there are robust controls on how my data is used (and it supports high quality adblock), I could see myself using it regularly.
Edit: I forgot iOS Safari can install extensions. Android users can install Firefox and then install extensions, but this is a big ask for the typical user.
Probably still a good estimate that <0.5% of mobile users have ever installed an extension.
Chrome on Android does not support extensions (maybe in the future with manifest v3?), but Firefox does.
How about agents canceling services I no longer want? Or agents figuring out what choices I have to make to get my return picked up rather than have to take it to a drop off or pay?
There was the open web, with lots of rich api's... All of that got killed for the sake of profit and market consolidation. Are those same players going to be tolerant of agents cutting into their bottom line, of agents that cant be upsold, that dont misclick?
IF we ever get a solid agenic tooling I suspect that it will be murdered in its crib by industry.
https://www.diabrowser.com/