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Browse in speed mode, night mode and sync to the cloud with easy gesture controls

Browse in speed mode, night mode and sync to the cloud with easy gesture controls

Vote: (339 votes)

Program license: Free

Developer: UCWeb

Version: 2.3.2.300

Works under: Android

Also available for Windows

Vote:

Program license

(339 votes)

Free

Developer

Version

UCWeb

2.3.2.300

Works under:

Also available for

Android

Windows

Pros

  • Browser optimized for tablets
  • Numerous modern browser features
  • Speed mode

Cons

  • Some gestures unreliable

UC Browser HD is a Web browser built from scratch for the mobile experience.

A majority of the most popular mobile browsers — Chrome, for instance — were actually built for the desktop Web and then tweaked for mobile. While that approach works in general, it doesn’t take full advantage of the devices we’re using. UC Browser HD helps to change that by being built from the ground up for Android tablets. It supports all screen sizes and even has a phone mode.

The best selling point among many for this free web browser is how fast it opens webpages. This a well-oiled machine in that regard, and while we didn’t perform any technical speed tests, we could feel the difference against the other major browsers we commonly use. UC Browser HD also has very refined and intuitive controls, but advanced controls, which we’ll discuss more in closing, come up a bit short.

Not only is UC Browser HD fast and refined, but it comes loaded with nearly all of the advanced features modern Web surfers expect: tabbed browsing, cloud sync, incognito mode, night mode and so forth. It also has a speed mode, which is a particularly useful feature that does things like compress images in order to reduce data usage and maximize the speed at which pages load.

Another feature worth highlighting is its emphasis on tablet formatting. We tend to think of the mobile Web format as a singular concept, but in truth, websites optimized for smartphones are often as different from those optimized for tablets as they are from desktop formats. Many websites have tablet templates you may not even be aware of, and this browser does a great job of not only defaulting to them by giving you the option of which available format to use on a per-page basis.

The only issue with UC Browser HD is that some of the advanced gestures are somewhat unreliable. Swipe left or right, for instance, always work as you’d expect it to, but if you double-finger swipe in either direction — which lets you change tabs — the result is hit or miss. It was unreliable enough that we began tapping the desired tab directly and abandoned the gesture altogether.

Pros

  • Browser optimized for tablets
  • Numerous modern browser features
  • Speed mode

Cons

  • Some gestures unreliable