Benchmark Results: Page Load Times

The test sites used in our page load time testing are as follows: Google, YouTube, Yahoo!, Amazon, Wikipedia, eBay, Craigslist, and The Huffington Post. As explained in Web Browser Grand Prix VI: Firefox 6, Chrome 13, Mac OS X Lion, we modified these tests to render at 1080p, and to more closely reflect real-world usage. Instead of the home pages of Amazon, Wikipedia, eBay, and Craigslist, we use functional areas of those sites.

The chart below is a detailed view of the times each Web browser takes to load the individual pages.

This next chart contains the page load time composite score, which is an average of the eight page load times on each Web browser.

Google manages to retain the lead with Chrome 14, and Safari again places second. IE9 also holds onto third place, while Firefox 7 allows Mozilla to edge past Opera to take fourth place.

Clearly, the WebKit-based browsers (Chrome and Safari) take this one. Internet Explorer is a solid middle-of-the-road option. Firefox and Opera are the least attractive from the perspective of page load times, though keep in mind that all of the browsers average page loads in under one second, which isn't too shabby.