DuckDuckGo announces desktop browser with robust privacy protection

DuckDuckGo announces desktop browser with robust privacy protection

San Francisco, Jan. 5, 2022

Privacy-focused search engine DuckDuckGo is working on an „everyday“ desktop browser, according to CEO Gabriel Weinberg. In a blog post, Weinberg explained that the company is building a desktop app „from the ground up,“ using rendering engines provided by the operating system rather than Chromium, the browser codebase that underlies Google Chrome, Microsoft Edge and other browsers.

This allows DuckDuckGo to „remove a lot of unnecessary baggage that has accumulated over the years in the major browsers,“ Weinberg said. The CEO noted that the browser will have „robust privacy“ by default, meaning users won’t have to enable it in security settings.

Like the mobile version, the desktop browser will include a fire button to clear saved data, tabs and browsing history.

According to the CEO, initial tests have shown that the browser is „significantly faster“ than Google Chrome. The browser is currently in closed beta on macOS, and a release date has not yet been announced.

In his blog post, Weinberg also touched on the company’s 2021 achievements. One of them was reaching 150 million downloads of its privacy apps for iOS and Android and Chromium extensions.