Helium

About

Helium is a Chromium-based browser that blocks ads, trackers, cookie banners, and third-party cookies, and tampers with fingerprinting, by default. It collects no data, shows no browser ads, and makes no background requests without your consent. It also removes Google service dependencies and makes zero web requests on first launch.

Helium has a compact, minimal interface with four layout options, each customizable with toolbar options and color themes, plus a Frameless mode for focusing on the web. It supports all Chromium extensions, customizable keyboard shortcuts, web app installs, vertical tabs, split view, MRU tabbing, and tab groups. It also automatically optimizes for minimal resource usage, and you can hibernate tabs you don't need right now. Its !bangs feature, processed locally, sends you directly to a website without a search results page.

All Helium components are open source and available on GitHub. Helium is free with no adware or paid upgrade tier, and its development is crowdfunded by users. Limitations include no built-in password manager, no Widevine DRM support, no data sync yet, and no mobile version yet, as it is currently a desktop browser available in beta.