Safari 4 Beta March 2009
Apple Safari 4 Beta first look review
Apple has released a beta version of its Safari web browser. We tried out the Safari 4 beta to see whether it makes surfing the web quicker and easier. Read our verdict on the new Safari interface, search tools and added extras.
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All Mac users will be familiar with the Safari web browser that Apple provides – and now there’s a chance for everyone to have a look at version 4, with the release of the public beta for both Mac and Windows.
Beta releases are unfinished versions of new software that let users point out any problems before the final product is completed – however, this new version worked impressively well, with no obvious problems.
Your most visited sites are displayed at start-up
The first thing you'll notice is the start-up screen. This shows you an impressive selection of thumbnail images of your favourite sites – the selection will change as Safari spots the sites you visit most – that are freshly downloaded each time you open the browser. If there’s been a change since you last visited a site, there'll be a blue star to highlight this, meaning the whole page is a great way of keeping up to date with the latest news and events.
Safari 4 interface
There are some tweaks to the interface that fit in well with the sleek and minimal Mac style. The tabs for tabbed browsing sit right at the very top of the window, freeing up more space for the web page. And the zoom function works well: like the browser on the iPhone, zooming in and out resizes images as you go.
Leaf through pages to find what you're looking for with cover flow
And the ‘cover flow’ interface is another aspect that'll be familiar to iPhone or iTunes users – this is the bit that lets you leaf through a series of 3D pages to find what you're after, and Apple have applied this to you browsing history to good effect. This means you can scroll through snapshot gallery of every page you've visited, making it easy to spot the one you want.
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And you can even search the pages in your history – not just the titles, but all the text in all the pages you've visited, which will mean it’s a simple matter to track down that interesting news story you were reading last week.
Apple also claims there are less obvious improvements too – for instance, complex web pages should display more quickly.
Overall, this is a stable release with some interesting new features. It’s available for Mac or PC at www.apple.com/uk/safari/download
Pros: Useful new features
Cons: Still a beta release
Using another web browser? Check out our guides to Google Chrome and Internet Explorer .
