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Opera, not Microsoft Edge, is the best for battery life, says Opera

"Better luck next time, Microsoft!" says Opera's director of software development, who criticized the Redmond giant for not being transparent about its testing methodology.
Written by Adrian Kingsley-Hughes, Contributing Writer

Earlier this week Microsoft claimed that its Edge browser offered the best battery life for those browsing on mobile devices. However, browser underdog Opera thinks that Microsoft was a little hasty in declaring itself the winner.

"Like most other engineering teams, we love it when someone picks a fight," writes Błażej Kaźmierczak, Opera's director of software development. "If we get beaten in a test like this, we consider it a bug."

Since Microsoft didn't clearly outline its battery testing methodology, Opera came up with its own set of automated tests to simulate browsing to popular websites. The exact methodology used by Opera in the testing -- down to the websites used and the user input that was simulated -- is outlined by Opera.

"If Microsoft really wants to prove that its browser performs better than others (in any regard)," writes Kaźmierczak, "the company should be transparent about its methodology so that others can replicate it."

The results claim that Opera's latest Developer release (39.0.2248.0) can run 22 percent longer than Edge, and 35 percent longer than Chrome when ad blocking and power saver features are enabled. All testing was done on a Lenovo Yoga 500 laptop running Windows 10 64-bit.

Opera, not Microsoft Edge, is the best for battery life, says Opera

Opera claims that its browser beats Microsoft's Edge in battery tests.

"Better luck next time, Microsoft!" said Kaźmierczak.

Kyle Pflug, a program manager for the Microsoft Edge team, has responded to Opera's claims.

"This test turned on an ad blocker, which is off by default," says Pflug. "Not loading and rendering the same content in all browsers."

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