Vivaldi is the first truly unique browser I ever came across. It feels like it’s built on a cohesive philosophy entirely, and even if other browsers can’t copy that philosophy, they can steal the many awesome features this browser has.
9
Smarter Tab Management
Vivaldi goes way beyond tab groups or overview windows for tab management. First, Vivaldi offers tab stacking. Stacked tabs show up in a separate tab row entirely, directly below the original one. If you’re multitasking, you can keep all your tabs quickly accessible. You can create as many of these as you need.
Then there’s tab tiling. With tab tiles, you can quickly tile tabs next to each other in columns. It’s great for research or studying because it saves you the hassle of jumping back and forth between tabs. Good for focus.
You can hibernate tabs you no longer need to save RAM, and come back to activate them when you’re ready again. Hibernation works with entire windows too.
And to keep all these tabs under control, there’s a side panel that gives you an overview of all open and past tabs and windows, where you can quickly tile, stack, pin, and hibernate them.
8
Workspaces That Actually Work
Firefox technically has this feature, but it works with an add-on that you have to install yourself. Workspaces in Vivaldi are way more seamless and powerful. The feature is baked into the browser, so you don’t need to install an add-on. You might have to enable it first though. You can do so in the settings menu.
You can create a new workspace, say for work, and it becomes a siloed container where you can log into all your work accounts, and keep them separate from your personal stuff. That way, your digital work life and personal life stay separate, and you stay organized.
Vivaldi gives each workspace its own tab bar. You can switch between them from the sidebar or with a keyboard shortcut. Vivaldi also lets you save sessions for later. You can select a few tabs, right-click and select “Save Session,” give it a name, and Vivaldi will let you recall this exact set of tabs with one click.
7
Native Mail, Calendar, and RSS Feed Reader
This is one of those features that gets glanced over. I did too, until I figured out what those tiny icons actually are. Turns out, Vivaldi has three entire apps baked into it.
The mail client lets you log into any email address (IMAP or POP3), and access your mail without opening a new tab. It’s always accessible in the sidebar. And here’s where it gets even more powerful: you can log into multiple accounts, and have all your email, across every account, available in one place. You can draft, send, and manage your mail right through the sidebar. Also, you get a ton of customization and filtering options in Vivaldi’s mail app (more than you would with the default client).
There’s also a Calendar app that works locally and can connect to Outlook or Google Calendar. It automatically pulls your tasks from the calendar and shows them as a list in the Tasks app (also in, built).
They’re not as popular as they once were, but for the few people who still prefer curated RSS feeds over faceless algorithms, Vivaldi comes with an in-built RSS reader too.
Firefox does have a screenshot feature you can find on the right-click context menu, but I prefer Vivaldi’s version. The screenshot tool in Vivaldi is a persistent snapshot icon on the bottom bar, and it can do more.
Click the camera icon in the status bar. You can capture the full page or a selected region, and from there you can decide if you want to save it as a PNG, JPEG, copy it to the clipboard, or even clip it as a note.
On the side panel, you’ll find a reading list too. To save any web page to it, open that tab, and click the plus button on the reading list. It’ll automatically save the tab to your reading list. The reading list syncs, along with everything else.
You’ll also find a notes mini app on the same side panel. The notes support rich text and markdown, and automatically sync with the rest of your account. It’s extremely handy because you never have to leave your browser or open a new tab, just to jot down a quick note.
5
Spotlight But For the Browser
There’s also a Quick Commands bar (press Ctrl+E). It gives you quick access to pretty much everything in the browser here: your open tabs, settings, bookmarks, notes, history, toggle UI elements, workspaces, and even gestures or navigation. It feels like Spotlight for the browser.
It’s such a unique feature, but it’s equally functional once you get used to it.
4
Deep Customization
Vivaldi is hands down the most customizable browser I’ve ever seen. Pretty much every part of the interface can be tweaked one way or another. The theme section comes with its own theme builder that can tweak everything from icons to accent colors and transparency effects. Vivaldi can even connect with Razer Chroma devices to integrate the browser theme with the lights.
The entire primary toolbar is customizable; every single icon can be replaced or re-positioned. You can change how tabs align: top, bottom, left, or right. You can change the default tab size, their accents, even how they show progress for loading sites.
Here you can also configure the tab stacking feature and choose to show tab stacks as accordion folders or two rows.
The side panel and the address bar are just as customizable, and allow Vivaldi to adapt your personal workflows. Finally, you can also adjust the start page dashboard, and make it as minimalist or as maximalist as you like.
3
Mouse Gestures and Spatial Navigation
Vivaldi also comes with solid support for mouse gestures, if you prefer working with those. By default, you get a dozen premapped gestures you can start using right away. You can use those gestures to go backwards, forwards, open new tabs, close tabs, look up history, and more.
And if you want to expand on the map, you can even create your own custom actions and shortcuts using your own mouse gestures.
2
Page Actions
Next to the screenshot capture button, there’s a Page Actions icon that lets you apply visual and text filters to every webpage that Vivaldi loads. For instance, you can set the font to monospace or make the webpages sepia or black and white. You can also increase contrast, invert colors, dim the page, or disable transitions or animations.
It ties every website you visit into a cohesive, persistent theme. Typically, you have to install third-party extensions to do this, but Vivaldi has this little feature baked right in.
1
Amazing Keyboard Support
Vivaldi was designed with a keyboard, first vision. You can comfortably navigate and use this browser for a long time before you even need to touch the mouse, just using keybinds and single-key shortcuts. By default, shortcuts are already assigned for focus, cycling, and triggers for most of the UI. And you can easily set more triggers for UI elements you care about, giving you a full keyboard, powered browsing experience.
Since there are so many shortcuts, you might be worried about having to remember them all, but Vivaldi makes that part easy for you. Just press Ctrl+F1 to pull up the keyboard cheatsheet.
These few features deserve wider adoption because they can genuinely improve our browsing experience, but while other browsers catch up, you can always give Vivaldi a try.
