Goodbye Arc, back to Safari.

After years of using Arc, loving the approach to browser functionality, I’ve decided to move on.

The more I want out of this browser, the more its little barriers become big ones. Add to this that development is closed, I’ve decided to let go of the sidebar and return to Safari.

I’ll forever appreciate Arc’s encouragement for shortcut key browsing, but the more I used it, the more I felt Arc wasn’t actually a workhorse browser but a browser designed towards user simplicity. Problem is, that simplicity creates hard barriers, not open customisation.

Given the current narrative that the next iteration of Arc doubles down on mass market simplicity, it’s time to invest my time back with Safari and bring some of those behaviours over.

I hope Arc make space for dev’s and ‘pro’ users to tweak the next iteration of their browser in their favour, but I don’t see it happening. I suspect they’ll build a very stable, capable browser, that firmly delivers simplicity over power and customisation.