Kagi, the company behind a paid, private search engine1 of the same name, has announced it’s bringing its Webkit-based Orion web browser to Linux.

In a post on BlueSky, Kagi said: “We’re thrilled to announce that development of the Orion Browser for Linux has officially started!”.

Orion is currently only available on macOS and iOS but was built to be better than Apple’s own Safari, and best Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox and other browsers in many areas.

Orion is a zero-telemetry browser; has built-in ad and tracking blocking; and reportedly offers lower memory usage, faster page speeds, and greater battery efficiency on Apple devices than other browsers. It also supports both Chrome and Firefox extensions.

Orion web browser
Orion Browser on macOS supports Chrome and Firefox Add-ons

Whether all of those USPs can be carried over to Linux—a less defined ‘platform’ than macOS if targeting things like power efficiency—remains to be seen. Kagi is hopeful; they say the Orion Linux build will have feature-parity with the macOS version by next year.

Orion Browser for Linux

Obviously, Orion’s (current) closed-source nature will not endear it to everyone. Plenty of Linux users simply can’t countenance using Steam, Spotify, Vivaldi, Slack, Discord, Google Chrome, WhatsApp or other non-free2 apps, tools, or services.

—That’s fair; we’re free to choose the software that works for us on whatever level that matters, be it utility, integration, or indeed license model.

Yet, the idea of being able to run a fast, user-friendly, and flexible WebKit-based web browser on Linux is a promising development for choice, if nothing else. GNOME Web/Epiphany shows the promise WebKit offers – Orion may bring the polish.

Kagi has started work on open-sourcing many components used in Orion and plans to open source more — the small team is the bottleneck; forking WebKit, porting hundreds of APIs, and building a browser from scratch takes resources.

“Properly maintaining an open-source project takes time and resources we’re short on at the moment, so if you want to contribute at this time, please consider becoming active on orionfeedback.org,” they add.

If you’re interested in learning more about Orion (for macOS) check out the Orion landing page on the Kagi website, or read through a comprehensive FAQ. To sign-up for news on the upcoming Linux version, plug in an e-mail in the sign-up form.

The saying goes “if you’re not paying for the product, you are the product” —unless open-source, I tend to add if I hear someone say it! Alas, Mozilla’s recent faux-pas suggests that even noble projects aren’t immune to the shiny glint of ick.

Thanks Sambot!

  1. I haven’t tried Kagi Search but it’s tempting now most search engines are increasingly focused on getting people to spend money, not find information. ↩︎
  2. Non-free as in they are not free open source software. Most are ‘free’ to download/use. ↩︎