Why are (mobile) browsers so big? (lemmy.world)

submitted 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) by illectrility@lemmy.world to c/asklemmy@lemmy.ml

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Why are so many mobile browsers at least 100, if not 200 megabytes in size? Even Firefox Focus which is supposed to be small and, you know, focussed is 85MB big.

The smallest browser I could find was the /e/ Foundation's built-in browser for /e/OS. It's 12MB.

It's kind of between Firefox and Focus in terms of features so why are all other browsers so big? Is there a small version of Firefox for Android?

Edit: I just looked up the /e/ Browser repo on their GitLab and the browser appears to be bigger than the 12MB displayed in App Info. It's about 70MB, so pretty comparable to the other browsers. I was so confused by the size difference but that's cleared up now.

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[-] illectrility@lemmy.world 4 points 10 months ago

I understand, my confusion was caused by the misleading app size shown in App Info. It's actually like 70MB so my question is dumb. I'm sorry for wasting your time

[-] rockSlayer@lemmy.world 7 points 10 months ago

it's not dumb, and you didn't waste my time! I love teaching computer science to people. Honestly, this was kinda fun. I haven't consciously thought about these concepts in about 6 years, so it was a good refresher for me too lol

[-] illectrility@lemmy.world 6 points 10 months ago

I'm glad to hear that, I had fun, too. Thank you for your time and have an amazing day, kind stranger

this post was submitted on 28 Oct 2023

71 points (93.8% liked)

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