OpenAI to release web browser in challenge to Google Chrome

https://www.cnbc.com/2025/07/09/openai-to-release-web-browser-in-challenge-to-google-chrome.html

by mooreds • 1 year ago

42 53 1 year ago

cnbc.com

coffeebeqn• 1 year ago

I’m assuming this is some kind of a layer on top of chromium?

WJW• 1 year ago

It literally says that in TFA.

ethan_smith• 1 year 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.

conartist64• 1 year ago

It also gives them huge ongoing costs which few engineers in the world know how to pay.

Every line of code costs something to own. Forking a few million lines is free now, but the more time passes the more you will pay to own those lines.

rvnx2• 1 year ago

Investors at Perplexity are now crying. Company is dead, killed by its supplier, like Cursor

throwoutway• 1 year ago

Or this isn't real and is just a scare tactic

dude250711• 1 year ago

It would be a shame if YouTube/Maps/Google/etc. suddenly would not work properly or fast on this browser...

rvnx2• 1 year 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

carlosjobim2• 1 year ago

No problem for smart phone users, they install the apps for these services.

perihelions• 1 year ago

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• 1 year 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.

jillesvangurp• 1 year 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.

yoavm• 1 year ago

It's pretty much impossible to create WebExtensions that provide a complete experience and feel native. The API is (perhaps rightfully so) quite restrictive.

xnx4• 1 year 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• 1 year ago

That’s absolutely untrue? On iOS extensions are supported, and I hope an android too!

MattPalmer1086• 1 year ago

You can install add ons in Firefox mobile.

_Algernon_3• 1 year 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%

leptons• 1 year ago

I've been hearing that Chrome/Android will be supporting extensions soon.

rs186• 1 year ago

Care to read the article?

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.

noname120• 1 year ago

Why not acquire Dia from The Browser Company?

https://www.diabrowser.com/

bradleyjg• 1 year ago

Strange how in the end KDE Konqueror beat out Netscape Navigator and Internet Explorer. No one would have believed it.

danielbln2• 1 year ago

The name was prescient. It conquered alright.

pjmlp3• 1 year ago

Especially when ignoring that Blink has very little of it left.

Y_Y2• 1 year ago

How many of your body's cells have been with you since birth?

msgodel• 1 year ago

I was actually running Konqueror as my primary browser before Chrome was released. It was really great at the time, way faster than Firefox.

zer00eyz• 1 year 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.

CuriouslyC• 1 year 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.

yahoozoo• 1 year ago

Is this the next step towards AGI?

pjmlp3• 1 year ago

Another reskin, I rather have the original one.

conartist64• 1 year 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

_njyk• 1 year ago

Not really if you are a Chromium fork. Difficult from ground-up but from Chromium it’s rather easy. Way easier than creating an LLM. Even easier when you can hire the Chromium developers.

conartist64• 1 year ago

You clearly think how they think. It's just so EASY to do. Practically done already. With an attitude like that how could they not succeed in tackling a really, really hard problem that requires nearly endless thankless investment?

dtagames• 1 year ago

Like The Browser Company, that gave up on Arc to make Dia, an "AI browser" that's sure to have an equally short life.

I get that everyone wants to be a platform and to live where the user is all day, but getting folks to switch browsers is nearly impossible and, on Apple, fully impossible as only Safari-based browsers are permitted and those are highly restricted.

flyinglizard• 1 year ago

We're on a Google and OpenAI collision timeline. Google has to win to stay relevant, while OpenAI has to win to survive.

Looking at my own usage patterns, Google's ad business should have be long gone now, but then again I've been running adblockers since forever so maybe I just don't understand the dynamics here. Google has to recapture the perceived (or actual) lead in the AI market before its made obsolete and OpenAI has to keep Google on the defense otherwise it will just be commoditized away (I think this is more about good old market share here and no one waits around for AGI to unlock a spectacular economic value, they want each other's money now).

This is the second step in just a month or so where OpenAI directly encroaches on Google territory (first was with the recruitment of Johnny Ive to sidestep established mobile platforms and now going straight for Google's jugular).

It would be really interesting once OpenAI gets into the ad business, because right now Google has its share of ad revenue on hard allocation, and once in-stream AI advertising opens up it would surely divert some of that money.

MeteorMarc• 1 year ago

Will it be possible to disable the AI in their browser?

bentt• 1 year ago

This would make giving them all my data so much easier for them. That is the endgame, right? OpenAI becomes the advertiser of record using the best, richest, most targeted data ever. And we gave it all to them. “Dumb Fucks” -Zuck

arctics• 1 year ago

so basically the logic is gather your analytic data directly and tailor AI for your needs to sell you things, basically remove middle man Google, no?

ChrisArchitect• 1 year ago

[dupe] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44513117

OpenAI to release web browser in challenge to Google Chrome

Related Stories