5 Best Browsers For Online & Offline Reading

The best option is a browser with reading mode & dark theme

Reading time icon 7 min. read


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Key notes

  • A great browser reader should incorporate a fast and stable experience without ads, no pop-ups and other distracting elements, and good web page loading times.
  • Over the last few years, Microsoft Edge has evolved, and part of this has been in creating the most advanced browser Reader mode.
  • Most modern browsers offer great features for reading, but on this list, we present the very best available. 

Because most of the reading we do in the 21st century is performed on a hand-held device, it is essential to choose a suitable device, but the browser you use, also matters.

The online reading tool is vital because it can offer you a wide range of features that can provide a better experience.

Because of the wide range of browsers available on the market today, it is a daunting task to find the perfect one for your needs. Some browser options offer better speeds, and other software options are better at blocking ads.

Other options have a low impact on your system resources; others look good without valuable capabilities.

For these reasons, we will explore some of the best browser software options available on the market that allow you to have a beautiful and calm reading experience.

You may also want to try out any of these 5 best speed reading software.

Which browser has a reading mode?

Many browsers offer a reading mode. In fact, most modern browsers have this feature built-in. A few that should make your go-to are:

  • Opera One
  • Microsoft Edge
  • Google Chrome
  • UR browser
  • Firefox

While these are our top choices, browsers like Brave, Vivaldi, Safari, Epic, and Chromium all have a reader mode.

Note that for a browser software to qualify for this list, it should offer you:

  • A fast and stable experience without getting bugged by ads
  • No pop-ups and other distracting elements
  • Good web-page loading times
  • Possibility to extend features

The browsers on our list are also among the best browser options for use on Windows 10/11. Let’s jump right to it.

What are the best browsers for reading?

Opera One– Best for social integration and sharing

Opera One is a highly versatile browser that you can use for various purposes, including reading text and online books.

If you prefer to read your news online, Opera One has a very nifty personal news feature. This feature supports the RSS feed and lets you personalize your news feed, choose your news sources, highlight particular news categories, and choose the language you want to display news in.

There are two view modes available: Timeline, where you get an estimated reading time, and Magazine.

Have you found something interesting that you want to read later? Bookmark the respective page for later use. Use the Bookmark Manager to organize your bookmarks better.

If you need additional information on the content you’re reading, you don’t need to leave the website you’re on. Thanks to the Instant Search feature, you can look at something on the web within the active tab.

If you find an exciting piece of information, you can use the integrated messengers to share it with your friends.

As you can see, Opera One has all the features you need for a fantastic in-browser reading experience.

Additional features:

  • Workspaces
  • Snapshot tool
  • Search in tabs

Opera One

A constant pioneer, Opera One offers multiple ways of reading text on websites.

UR Browser – Most lightweight

UR Browser is an incredibly powerful and reliable browser software that offers many valuable features, helping you read on your Windows device. Beyond this, you can customize and edit how this software reacts, looks, and works with just a few clicks.

This browser was built with privacy in mind, offering you one of the best privacy packages you could ever find. When using UR Browser, you won’t have to install third-party extensions to protect yourself from ads, malware, trackers, and even sites that collect cookies.

All of these protection elements come built into UR Browser. You also have the option of modifying the level of privacy you need by being able to choose from low, medium, and high privacy settings.

If the latter option is selected, UR Browser will automatically start its powerful VPN (Virtual Private Network) service to ensure your personal information is protected.

UR Browser’s impact on your system resources is barely noticeable, but that doesn’t mean the software developers cut corners to achieve this. Our tests have proven that UR Browser clocks some of the best speeds when it comes to web page loading speeds.

All the above features make choosing the best browser for reading on your Windows device a straightforward decision. UR Browser is one of the best reading options, but it also trumps other browser capabilities in other areas.

Additional features:

  • Viru scanner
  • Third-party cookies blocker
  • No complicated settings

UR Browser

One of the browsers with rising popularity provides Reader Mode.

Mozilla Firefox – Best for privacy

best browser for reading

Mozilla Firefox is another excellent browser, offering strict and efficient online security, privacy, and protection from ads and malware. Even though these features are good in their department, they can’t compare to the privacy and security features in our top pick, UR Browser.

In our malware tests with default security settings for each of the browsers, Opera One and UR Browser performed the best, with a second-place for Firefox and third for Google Chrome.

Even though UR Browser is superior, Firefox can still offer you a good reading experience by eliminating any possible distractions from pop-ups and ads.

One of Firefox’s downsides is that your access to your bookmarks is very complicated, the ‘Home screen’ is usually hard to understand and use, and it also contains a lot of ads and suggested links. However, it is still regarded as one of the best browser options for reading Manga.

Additional features:

  • Unified address bar search
  • Enhanced tracking protection
  • Page Actions menu

⇒ Get Mozilla Firefox

Microsoft Edge – Best browser for reading mode

best browser for reading

We consider this to be the best browser for reading articles.

In Windows, Immersive Reader in Microsoft Edge streamlines web page layouts, clears the clutter, and lets you personalize your reading experience. Edge Immersive Reader has many fantastic study and accessibility features that may aid with reading and learning comprehension.

Its Immersive Reader was first created for dyslexic and dyspraxia readers. However, this program might be helpful for everyone who wishes to make reading on a portable device more convenient!

Additionally, it contains a Read Aloud function, a simple yet effective tool that reads your web page contents out loud.

Apart from this, it is based on the Chromium engine and allows a variety of expansions utilizing extensions from the Chrome library, which is why we adore it.

Additional features:

  • Device syncing
  • Privacy control
  • Data importation

⇒ Get Microsoft Edge

Google Chrome – Most expandable

Google Chrome is one of the best-known browsers on the market, and it shouldn’t come with any surprise, considering the behemoth that runs this software. It should be your pick if you need the best browser for PDF reading.

Because of Google’s databases, Google Chrome has a very powerful engine that runs its processes fast but still can’t match the speeds that UR Browser clocked in our tests.

Regarding privacy level, ad blocking, and malware security, Chrome falls short even when compared to Mozilla Firefox and can’t even be compared with our top pick, UR Browser.

The Chrome architecture is built so that every tab you open counts as another executable file running in your computer’s processes.

The high system impact this browser has, qualifies Google Chrome only for the fifth place in our top best browsers for reading. It can become very frustrating to wait for pages to load, and slowing down your computer further doesn’t help either.

Additional features:

  • Tab screencasting
  • Omnibox web page search
  • Live video captions

⇒ Get Google Chrome

In this article, we explored some of the best browser software options on the market that have the necessary speeds and features to help you read online. UR Browser stands out for its speed and ease of use, but Microsoft Edge has the most advanced Reader Mode.

Please let us know your experience with the browsers on our list in the comment section below.

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