YabArdia vs Orion
Ardia is a free, open-source Chromium browser for the Mac that pairs Arc’s sidebar with Dia’s look: pinned tabs, profiles you swipe between, Split View, the Chrome Web Store and uBlock Origin built in.
Orion is Kagi’s browser for Mac, iPhone and iPad, on WebKit, the engine Safari uses, that also runs many Chrome and Firefox extensions. It has no telemetry and blocks ads by default.
The short answer
- if you want Arc’s sidebar on Chromium, free and open source
- if you want Chrome extensions and uBlock Origin built in
- if you don’t want AI in your browser
- if you want Safari’s engine with Chrome and Firefox extensions, on Mac and iPhone
- if you want ads blocked and no telemetry from the start
- if you pay for Kagi Search
- if you miss Arc and want spaces, pins and folders kept, on a Mac
- if you already pay for Claude or ChatGPT and want it to work in your signed-in tabs
At a glance
Ardia and Orion, with Yab beside them for a Mac.
| What | Ardia | Orion | Yab |
|---|---|---|---|
| Made by | Mantra (open-source project) | Kagi | Serafim Korablev |
| Status | Updated | Updated | Updated |
| Runs on | Mac | Mac and iPhone | Mac |
| Phone app | None; Mac only | iPhone and iPad; syncs tabs, bookmarks and passwords with your Mac through iCloud | Yab for iPhone (TestFlight) and Yab for Android, both in beta; they sync spaces, tabs, bookmarks, history and chats |
| Price | Free and open source | Free; Orion+ supporter plan $5/month, $50/year or $150 once | Free; its AI runs on your own Claude or ChatGPT plan |
| AI | No AI | Chat about pages, on its own AI service | An agent that works in pages, on your Claude or ChatGPT plan |
| Driven by outside agents | No | No | MCP and a command line |
| Engine | Chromium | WebKit | WebKit |
| Tabs down the side | Yes | A setting | Yes |
| Spaces | Yes | Yes | Yes |
| Split View | Yes | No | Yes |
| Extensions | Chrome Web Store | Chrome and Firefox stores | Chrome Web Store |
| Ad blocker | Built in | Built in | Built in |
| Open source | Yes | No | No |
Checked October 9, 2026 on each maker’s own pages, linked under Sources. Prices are per month, in US dollars.
Where they differ
What separates them, area by area. Where one plainly has more, it says who; where it comes down to taste, it says so.
AIOrion leads
Orion has AI built in; Ardia has less of it. Ardia has no AI of its own. Orion sums up pages and videos through Kagi’s Summarizer, with a paid Kagi plan; no chat and no agent.
Tabs and windowsArdia leads
Ardia has tabs down the side, spaces, Split View, folders in the sidebar and tabs that sleep. Orion has tabs down the side as a setting, spaces, folders in the sidebar and tabs that sleep.
Priceeven
Ardia: Free and open source. Orion: Free; Orion+ supporter plan $5/month, $50/year or $150 once.
Where it runsOrion leads
Ardia runs on Mac. Orion runs on Mac and iPhone. On a Mac, Ardia needs macOS 14 or later and Orion needs macOS 10.14 or later. Ardia has no phone app: Mac only. On the phone, Orion: iPhone and iPad; syncs tabs, bookmarks and passwords with your Mac through iCloud.
Engine and extensionsa matter of taste
Ardia is built on Chromium, as Chrome is; Orion on WebKit, the engine Safari uses. Ardia takes extensions from the Chrome Web Store, Orion from both Chrome’s and Firefox’s stores.
PrivacyArdia leads
Ardia has an ad blocker built in and open code. Ardia syncs end to end encrypted through a folder in your own iCloud Drive, with no server of its maker in between; crash reports are opt-in. Orion has an ad blocker built in. Orion has no telemetry, Kagi says; page summaries and translations go to Kagi’s servers.
What their pages don’t lead with
Real limits, from the makers’ own words and our own use.
Ardia
- Mac only, Apple Silicon, macOS 14 or later
- New: first public in 2026, from a small open-source team
- No phone app
- No AI of its own
Orion
- Apple only: the Windows and Linux versions stopped on October 2, 2026
- Not every extension works: support is partial
- No Split View of two tabs
- Closed source, and page summaries need a paid Kagi plan
Yab, honestly
- Mac only on the desktop: macOS 15.4 or later, no Windows; the iPhone and Android apps are in beta
- New: first released in September 2026
- Its AI needs a Claude or ChatGPT plan; ChatGPT’s free plan may work with low limits
- WebKit by default, as in Safari; Chrome’s engine is a choice in beta (Nightly) for sites made only for Chrome
- Closed source
What changed lately
- October 27, 2026Ardia: 0.2.42 released, with a nightly channel beside it
- October 2, 2026Orion: Kagi ended Orion for Linux and Windows to focus on Mac and iOS
- June 23, 2026Orion: Orion 1.1 added per-tab containers and page translation
- November 25, 2025Orion: Orion 1.0 for Mac left beta
Questions
Is Ardia free?
Yes. Free and open source.
Is Orion free?
The browser is; its AI isn’t. Free; Orion+ supporter plan $5/month, $50/year or $150 once.
Which has an AI agent, Ardia or Orion?
Neither has an agent that does tasks in your pages. Ardia has no AI of its own. Orion sums up pages and videos through Kagi’s Summarizer, with a paid Kagi plan; no chat and no agent.
Which runs on Windows, Ardia or Orion?
Neither. Ardia runs on Mac; Orion on Mac and iPhone.
Do Ardia and Orion have phone apps?
Orion does. Ardia has no phone app: Mac only. On the phone, Orion: iPhone and iPad; syncs tabs, bookmarks and passwords with your Mac through iCloud.
Is there a third option on a Mac?
Yab, Yet Another Browser, is free for the Mac: tabs down the side with spaces, folders and Split View, as in Ardia; an agent that works in your signed-in tabs, on the Claude or ChatGPT plan you already pay for. Claude Code, Codex and any MCP client can drive it too. It runs on WebKit, the engine Safari uses, with Chrome’s engine as a choice in beta, and takes Chrome extensions. It is new, and its iPhone and Android apps are in beta.
More comparisons
- Ardia home page
- Ardia repo (GPL-3.0, Chromium, README features)
- Ardia 0.2.42 release
- Orion home page
- Kagi blog: Orion 1.0, 2025-11-25
- Kagi blog: An update on Orion for Linux and Windows, 2026-10-02
- Orion+ help page ($5/month, $50/year, $150 lifetime)
- Orion macOS release notes (1.1.3, 2026-09-28)
- Orion supported OS versions
- Orion update feed for macOS 10.14 (1.1.3, minimum 10.14.4)
- Orion Summarize Page
- Orion importing data
- Orion vertical tabs
- Orion tab groups
- Orion password management
- Orion ad and tracking blocking
- Orion respecting privacy (no telemetry)
- Orion Low Power Mode (suspends unused tabs)
- Orion FAQ (extensions, open source)
- Orion technical information (Web Extensions API support)
- Orion on the App Store (1.5.5)
- Orion feedback: split view request
- Kagi Help: Syncing Orion Data (tabs, bookmarks, reading list)
- Kagi Help: Troubleshooting syncing (iCloud Drive)
- Orion iOS/iPadOS release notes
- PiunikaWeb: Kagi says Orion for Android is ’not planned yet’ (2026-06-30)
- Yab Manual: Bringing in from another browser
- Yab Manual: Connecting Claude or ChatGPT
- Yab Manual: Extensions
- Yab Manual: Yab’s tools over MCP
- Yab Manual: Privacy
- Yab for iPhone on TestFlight
Yab, Yet Another Browser.
Free for the Mac. Arc’s sidebar, your own Claude or ChatGPT as the agent, Chrome extensions on WebKit.