Yandex Browser (Яндекс.Браузер) review, advantages and disadvantages

Yandex Browser (Russian: Яндекс.Браузер) is a freeware web browser, It is developed by the Russian technology corporation Yandex that uses the Blink web browser engine and is based on the Chromium open source project, The browser checks webpage security with the Yandex security system and checks downloaded files with Kaspersky Anti-Virus.

Yandex Browser

Yandex Browser is available for Windows, macOS, Linux, Android, and iOS, It is facing web search competition in Russia from Google Search, and Google Chrome, Yandex Browser reached 2.3% market share in Russia two months after its release, As of June 2022, Yandex Browser held 16.47% market share in Russia.

The name “Yandex” is a combination of the Russian word “ya” (meaning “I”) and the English word “index”. Yandex is a leader in artificial intelligence and machine learning research. Yandex presents a wide range of other products and services, such as web browsers, email services, cloud storage, maps and navigation, music streaming, and online advertising.

Yandex Browser has a sleek, stylish design, The program starts quickly, It offers Smartphone synchronization, Although it is offered by large search engines, users may easily switch to different engines. Yandex Browser uses Opera Software’s Turbo technology to speed web browsing on slow connections.

Yandex was created by Ilya Segalovich and Arkady Volozh while working for Arcadia in 1993, It was named Yandex as an abbreviation for Yet Another Indexer, and Yandex started issuing dividends, That year, they issued $100,000 of dividends, Yandex changed their advertisement system to a pay-per-click model, In 2004, Yandex maps started, They had detailed maps of Moscow, Saint Petersburg, and Kyiv. 

Russia’s most popular web browser uses Google Search as its default search engine, In June 2012, Mozilla Firefox, the world’s third most popular web browser, signed a deal to replace its default search engine Yandex Search with Google Search, As Yandex Browser’s “Smartbox” uses Yandex Search as its default search engine, the browser will help Yandex compete for Russian search market share.

Yandex is the largest media property in all of Russia. Yandex Browser is the second most popular desktop web browser (the third as a mobile browser) in Russia at 21.5%, while it is less popular in most other countries, e.g. in Ukraine fourth at 4.45% and globally has less share than Internet Explorer (which is sixth at 1.65%).

The Yandex company offers primarily a search engine, which is most popular in Russia, It offers other products and services, however, including this web browser, Although based on the Chromium engine, this browser has evolved enough that in appearance, if not functionality, it is noticeably different, The cosmetic changes took place mainly in the last major two versions.

Yandex offers its own self-driving car program, It has developed a facial recognition system that is more accurate than Google’s. It is a major player in the Russian e-commerce market, It has a poetry generator that can write poems in Russian and English, It has a music search engine that can identify songs by humming or singing them, It has a translation service that can translate over 100 languages.

Features of the Yandex Browser

Yandex Browser has a different “new tab” screen with a Windows 8-style interface and specialized widgets for popular services (e.g., the Gmail widget shows several unread messages), Yandex Browser comes with an integrated keyboard layout switcher in Omnibox. When connecting to open Wi-Fi networks or to the points that use the weak WEP defense, Yandex Browser automatically encrypts traffic between it and the HTTP site.

When the user uses gmail.com and starts typing “пьф” (“gma” with Russian keyboard layout) and presses Enter, the user will be taken to gmail.com and not to the search page for “пьф” (as is the case in Chrome, for example), On Android, it presents the ability to install chrome extensions on a mobile browser, it supports browser extensions from the Opera add-ons website.

Protect active security technology can scan files and websites for viruses, It can block fraudulent webpages, It can protect passwords and bank card details, and it can keep online payments safe from theft. Yandex Browser was the first browser to implement DNSCrypt technology, which encrypts Domain Name System (DNS) traffic, Yandex Browser can protect from the trojan DNSChanger, the tracking Internet provider, or hackers.

Advantages of Yandex over Google in Russia

Google can use its Android mobile operating system to grow mobile search due to the embedded nature of Google search in Android, but it’s not that effective in Russia, In Russia, Android has over 70 % of the Russian mobile market; yet, Yandex still has 52 % of the search market on these Android devices.

Yandex is the largest media destination in all of Russia and for many Russians, Yandex.ru is where they begin their day, Yandex presents free email, live traffic maps, music, videos, photo storage, and much more. Google was able to lure users away from weaker products such as Hotmail, Mapquest, and Dropbox to use the Google alternatives, In Russia, Google will not have this opportunity, because the Yandex versions are comparable, if not better.

The Russian online market is notorious for outright link spam methods, countless “ad” agencies exist to sell links to increase search rankings, So, Yandex announced they will not use links in their algorithms on commercial queries conducted in specific areas of the country, So, Yandex will solely use user experience and keyword ranking metrics.

Although Russians have an affinity for Russian brands they also seem to like foreign products, Russians might prefer using Yandex simply because they distrust Google. Yandex was created for the Russian market and is better able to handle specific Russian search challenges, Google is not nearly as effective at parsing user intent over spelling in non-English searches, but it is weaker in Russian.

Although Google’s search only ranks pages that are relevant to the specific user query as it is spelled, Yandex can parse the synonyms and user intent regardless of the user’s spelling, so, for highly infected search queries, Google is providing the weaker search experience and therefore does not make a solid case for why the user should use Google more frequently.

Disadvantages of Yandex Browser

Yandex Browser not only sends a hashed hardware identifier to Yandex but also every letter typed in the address bar and every URL visited by the user. Animated backgrounds can use extra system resources, On some computers, animated scenes can lag somewhat, No mention of Google tracking is disabled in the core engine, Yandex button links to a Russian language site.

Yandex has ceased to develop its operating system for Android, Google prevents promoting it among manufacturers of smartphones and tablets. There is no formatting toolbar when writing letters, There are little language interfaces

On Yandex search, Captcha is much bored, especially less dangerous for the USB-modem users, Yandex does not calm down after entering a code and prompts you to enter one, even highly pervasive nature get to the other part of Yandex, for example with the Ukrainian to Kazakhstan, the system will not let go, Will have to settle for the version of your country.

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