Brave Browser finally exits beta; version 1.0 now available

After four years of development, the Brave browser is finally out of beta. Brave 1.0 is now available for download.

Brave is a Chromium-based browser with an emphasis on personal privacy and thwarting the traditional advertising model used all around the Web. Instead, Brave uses a blockchain-based method of revenue generation called “Basic Attention Tokens.” These tokens allow users to support websites of their choice by showing some “privacy-respecting ads.” This revenue generation scheme is fully anonymous and is entirely optional, and the ads shown through Brave are not chosen based on website trackers, browsing history, or “fingerprinting.” (Other ad schemes, like Google’s AdSense, rely on one or more of these methods to choose relevant ads.)

Brave has been praised for its speed and good built-in tracker-blocking features. According to the company behind the browser, Brave saves “an average of 27 seconds per page load against Chrome on macOS and 22 seconds per page against Firefox.” These benchmarks are provided by the developers themselves and should be taken with a grain of salt, but Brave aims to use less memory and system resources than other browsers by blocking content and trackers. Of course, these speed differences rely heavily on browser extensions, web content, and a variety of other factors.

Brave currently enjoys 8.7 million monthly active users. The browser is available for all major platforms, including Windows, macOS, iOS, Android, and Linux. If you’d like to try Brave 1.0, you can download it from Brave’s website.

Do you use Brave? Why or why not? Let us know in the comments below.