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Phoenix is a fast and intuitive web browser designed explicitly for Android devices. Developed by CloudView technology in 2016, Phoenix is best known for simplifying watching and downloading videos online.
It’s also quite fast, lightweight, and easy to use, considering it can work in collaboration with Chrome.
Whether or not Phoenix can be your next default browser will be answered today — read our guide till the end to know everything about its features, disadvantages, privacy policies, and more.
Phoenix browser: Features
Phoenix supports video downloads in multiple formats and from multiple sites. Downloads happen faster and with minimal load on your system.
To keep your video downloads private, we recommend using Phoenix’s private video download feature. It’ll delete your history and remove every trace of the download.
Say you want to know which videos are downloadable on a site — you don’t have to click on them individually to check.
Phoenix has a smart video detection feature that automatically points out downloadable videos and leads you to them. However, this feature doesn’t work on YouTube owing to Google Play’s privacy policy.
Another benefit of using Phoenix is its built-in video player. No more hopping onto your gallery to play a video you’ve downloaded — play the video directly on the browser and lock the screen to avoid disturbances.
The Phoenix browser comes with an incognito mode very similar to Chrome that gives you access to the internet while remaining anonymous. No data is saved when you’re using the incognito mode, neither on your browser account nor by the Phoenix team.
Phoenix’s interface is a treat to the eyes. Its web view is built on Chromium, just like Chrome and Edge. This means that when you load a new site, all the elements of that site are displayed without breaking the site design. Unlike Opera, Phoenix doesn’t struggle with rendering the files of a website.
Our favorite thing about Phoenix is the no-image mode. Under this, the websites will only load the texts and leave out the images. This mode is perfect for researchers, students, and readers who don’t want the images to distract them or cause a delay in loading the page — the page loads much faster when images are left out of rendering.
The browser also lets you take custom screenshots of the web page. You can take a custom-sized picture by dragging your mouse and then annotating the picture right after. Unlike other browsers, you won’t have to go back to the gallery for the edits.
Phoenix has recently added a built-in ad blocker that keeps away ads, pop-ups, and annoying notifications. You can also check how many pages have been filtered and blocked during each session.
Phoenix browser: Privacy
Phoenix does fairly well in terms of privacy. For starters, it has an incognito mode that you can use to prevent the browser and other third parties from logging your data and search history.
Along with that, you can also use Phoenix’s “Privacy Space,” which basically acts as a second space on your browser. The downloads, bookmarks, and searches on this space do not overlap with the content on your main browsing page.
If you’re worried about someone snooping around your system, find respite in the “Clear Data” feature under the Toolbox option. In just one click, all your data, including your web history and cookies, will vanish. This feature can also be enabled to automatically delete your activity logs after every session.
Phoenix browser: Ease of use
Phoenix’s interface is fairly simple and easy to understand — that’s because it can be connected to Google. This way, you can get the perks of Phoenix on the interface of a browser you already know.
If you want the full Google experience, go to Settings and switch from “Google Custom Search” to just “Google.” Also, remember to opt out of their customer experience improvement program if you don’t want them to collect your data.
The only trouble you might face using Phoenix is that it sends you news notifications almost every day, and sometimes these notifications are not even based on your preference (because they don’t collect your data).
Phoenix browser: Competitors
The Phoenix browser is specially designed for Android users, so its biggest competitor should technically be Chrome.
However, Phoenix might have realized that competing with Chrome would be quite challenging, especially since Phoenix debuted much later than Chrome — in 2016.
That’s why Phoenix decided to work together with Chrome, and it is now also available as an add-on to your existing Chrome account. This way, you get the best of both browsers without switching apps.
Additional benefits that come with Phoenix include faster video downloads, faster page loading, and better security.
The one thing that makes Phoenix better than Chrome and Edge is the option to opt out of data collection. While the data collected by Phoenix will strictly be used to personalize your experience and serve you better, you still have the choice to say NO to it.
However, when it comes to other browsers like Avast, Opera, Mullvad, or even Firefox, Phoenix gets a lower rank in terms of user privacy. All these browsers offer extra privacy in some way or the other — either through a built-in VPN or an antivirus. However, all that Phoenix has to offer for free is an ad-blocker.
Need a top VPN for 360-degree security? Check out our best VPN buying guide.
Phoenix browser: Final verdict
Phoenix is a pretty decent browser. Sure, it doesn’t drop jaws in any parameter, be it privacy or features, but it does a little bit of everything, which makes it the perfect solution for those looking for a comprehensive solution.
Also, Phoenix is relatively fast and easy to use. For most average browser users, these two features make or break it.
Now, if you have advanced expectations from your browser, features like the “No Image Mode,” “One-click Data Clear,” and “Custom-sized Screenshots” may be enough to persuade you to get Phoenix.
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