Hey, welcome to Invitehawk.. Enjoy your stay and hope you have a good time here.

Hey, welcome to Invitehawk.. Enjoy your stay and hope you have a good time here.

Hey, welcome to Invitehawk.. Enjoy your stay and hope you have a good time here.

Hey, welcome to Invitehawk.. Enjoy your stay and hope you have a good time here.

Hey, welcome to Invitehawk.. Enjoy your stay and hope you have a good time here.

Hey, welcome to Invitehawk.. Enjoy your stay and hope you have a good time here.

Hey, welcome to Invitehawk.. Enjoy your stay and hope you have a good time here.

Hey, welcome to Invitehawk.. Enjoy your stay and hope you have a good time here.

Hey, welcome to Invitehawk.. Enjoy your stay and hope you have a good time here.

Hey, welcome to Invitehawk.. Enjoy your stay and hope you have a good time here.

Hey, welcome to Invitehawk.. Enjoy your stay and hope you have a good time here.

Hey, welcome to Invitehawk.. Enjoy your stay and hope you have a good time here.

Hey, welcome to Invitehawk.. Enjoy your stay and hope you have a good time here.

Hey, welcome to Invitehawk.. Enjoy your stay and hope you have a good time here.

Browser notifications let websites announce important updates. Websites send notifications to alert you to new emails, blog posts, or special offers. These notifications are genuinely useful in some cases like Gmail where it can notify you of a new email. But sadly, most websites these days have "abused" this feature to the point where you get bombarded with notifications. Notifications can interrupt your browsing experience and distract your focus thus they quickly turn into an annoyance. You can deny permission when a website requests you to send notifications. You would just have to do it for every website. So, wouldn't it be great if you could stop websites from sending you notifications altogether? Here's how you can do just that. How to Turn Off Google Chrome Notifications To disable website notifications on Chrome, follow the instructions below. Click the three-dot menu button on the right and click Settings. Scroll to the bottom and click Advanced. Find and click on Content Settings. Click Notifications. Toggle Ask before sending to the left and disable it. It should now display Blocked, indicating that notifications from all the websites will be blocked by default. Note that the websites that you've authorized to send notifications earlier can still send you notifications. If you want to block notifications from those websites, here's how you can do it. Scroll down to the Allow section. Tap the menu button next to the website you want to disallow notifications from. Select Remove. The website will no longer be able to send you notifications. Perhaps the best thing is that you can manually add an exception in the Allow section while still blocking out notifications from every other website out there. For instance, you can allow Facebook notifications, while disallowing annoying prompts from every other website. How to Turn Off Notifications for Chrome Android/iOS Disabling website notifications on Chrome for Android and iOS is pretty similar to that of Chrome on the desktop. Here's how. Open Chrome on your Android device or iPhone. Tap the three-dot overflow menu button and click Settings. Tap Site settings > Notifications. Toggle the Notifications switch to disable it. How to Turn Off Safari Notifications Like all notifications on Mac, the website notifications also slide out from the top right corner. Safari makes it pretty easy to stop websites from sending you notifications. Here's how to block website notifications on Safari. Click Safari > Preferences from your Mac's menu bar. Click on the Websites tab. Select Notifications from the sidebar. Uncheck the box where it says Allow websites to ask for permission to send push notifications. Once you enable this setting, websites will no longer prompt you to send notifications. As with Chrome, you can still explicitly Allow or Deny individual websites to send you notifications, overriding this global setting. Note that website push notifications are not supported on mobile Safari. I'm sure that there's a technical reason behind it, but I think it's a clever decision since we already have tons of apps that bomb us with notifications on our mobile devices. How to Turn Off Mozilla Firefox Notifications Firefox doesn't let you disable website notifications altogether from its regular Settings window. To change this setting, you'll need to dive into Firefox's hidden about:config page. Here's how you can do that. Type about:config in the address bar and press enter. Click on I accept the risk. Type "notifications" in the Search bar. Find and double-click on dom.webnotifications.enabled. Its preference value will now be changed to false, indicating that website notifications have been disabled. If you've already granted permission to a website to send you notifications, you can configure it by going to Firefox's Settings page. Go to Firefox > Preferences. Click Privacy & Security from the sidebar. Click the Settings button beside Notifications. Here, you should see the list of websites that have requested to send you notifications. You can click Allow or Deny and configure the setting for each website. As a Firefox user, you might also be interested in checking out different versions of Mozilla Firefox and trying something new. How to Turn Off Opera Notifications Opera makes it a breeze to disable websites from asking you to show notifications. Here's how to disable website notifications on Opera. Open Opera > Preferences. Click Websites from the sidebar. Scroll to the bottom and find the Notifications section. Select Do not allow any site to show desktop notifications. To configure notifications on a per-website basis, click on Manage Exceptions. Here, you can Allow or Deny individual websites from sending you notifications. Note that doing so will override the global setting configured above. How to Turn Off Microsoft Edge Notifications Website notifications saw the light of the day on Microsoft Edge with the Windows 10 Anniversary update. Unfortunately, Edge doesn't let you disable website notification prompts altogether. However, you can still configure notifications on a per-website basis. Here's how to configure website notifications on Edge. Click the menu icon and select Settings. Find Advanced settings > Website permissions. Here, you can configure permission for websites. We hope that Microsoft adds an option to disable notification prompts entirely in Edge. Until then, you'll have to deal with these prompts on a per-site basis. Edge at least seems to remember your preference for the current website, though. Say Goodbye to Annoying Website Notifications Chrome introduced website notifications back in 2015, and most browsers followed suit. It gave web apps a native feel by letting them push notifications. It seemed like a great idea back then. For the most part, it still is, but the sheer number of websites implementing them leads to a frustrating experience. For users who prefer Gmail's web version instead of a native client, website notifications might be a boon. But for most of the news websites, I really don't want to be notified every time you post a new update. The information overload is real and you can easily feel overwhelmed amid such chaos. I'd prefer to block most websites from displaying notification prompts altogether.

Google Chrome is the world's most popular browser, but even though it gets a lot right, you can still improve it. Chrome experts probably know that some of its best options are hidden. Many of these secret options live in the Chrome Flags menu. Let's discuss some of the best Chrome flags that you can tweak for a faster, handier, or more enjoyable experience. How Do I Get Chrome Flags? Chrome has a list of experimental features that you can access by entering this address in your search bar: chrome://flags Doing so will grant you access to the backdoor list of new options. This is a hidden Chrome page to prevent novice users from playing with them and accidentally creating issues. Not all of them are applicable for normal use, but you'll find several that are worth tweaking. Please note Chrome's warning that these flags can cause security issues and potential data loss. Note that since the flags aren't in any sort of order, use the search bar at the top of the screen to easily jump to them. Google may change or remove these flags at any time, so you shouldn't get too attached to them. Sometimes they end up in the stable release of Chrome as full features; other times they disappear. Once you've enabled the Chrome flags you want to try, just click the big Relaunch Now button at the bottom of the screen. Chrome will restart and you can use the flags you've turned on. How Do I Enable the New UI in Chrome? Google released Chrome version 69 in September 2018. This version marked a revamped user interface, complete with more rounded tabs than before. Since Chrome updates automatically, you're almost certainly using the new UI already. It doesn't hurt to check for updates while you're at it. You'll need to head into Chrome's options to do this. Wondering how to get to Chrome's settings to update? Click the three-bar Menu icon and browse to Help > About Google Chrome to check for browser updates. We used Chrome version 73 when creating this list. How Do I Go Back to the Old Chrome? Shortly after the new layout released, you could use a flag to go back to the old Chrome look. However, this flag is no longer available. Thus, the only way to go back to the old Chrome look would be to use an older version. We don't recommend this, as older versions aren't as secure. How to Reset Chrome Flags If you change some Chrome flags and later find something isn't working right, don't panic. Just open the flags page again and click the Reset all to default button. 1. Picture-in-Picture Mode Search: #enable-picture-in-picture. This also requires enabling #enable-surfaces-for-videos. Doing one task at a time is so last year. The latest trend is picture-in-picture mode, which allows you to pop out a window on your mobile device to watch a video or other content on top of another app. Using this flag, you can try the same on your desktop. It works fairly well; right-click twice on a YouTube video and choose Picture in picture. This will pop the video out into a window you can move around anywhere---even outside of Chrome. 2. Tab Discarding Search: #automatic-tab-discarding Chrome is infamous for sucking up a ton of memory. If you have a lower-end computer, you can use this flag to help conserve some RAM. Enabling it will make Chrome "disable" tabs that you haven't used in a while. They stay at the top of your browser and will reload when you click them. Visit chrome://discards to see some information about tab discarding. The list shows how "important" Chrome thinks each tab is. 3. Quickly Mute Tabs Search: #sound-content-setting Everyone hates sites that blast auto-playing videos every time you visit. To combat this, Chrome lets you right-click a tab and choose Mute site to keep it quiet in the future. But doing this will mute all future tabs of that site, which you might not want. Set this flag to Disabled and you'll get the old Mute tab action back. This lets you mute one tab of a website without affecting the audio if you open that site in the future. 4. Generate Passwords Automatically Search: #automatic-password-generation You hopefully know that using a strong password is paramount to online security. We recommend using a password manager to create and save strong passwords. If you don't want to try a dedicated app, you can try a built-in Chrome feature. Enable the flag above, make sure you're signed into your Google account in Chrome, and your browser will generate passwords on account creation pages. It syncs these to your Google account automatically. 5. Stop Websites from Hijacking Navigation Search: #enable-history-entry-requires-user-gesture Have you ever clicked the Back button on a website and found that you stayed on the same page? This is due to websites abusing the History feature in your browser and writing dummy entries that keep you on their page when you click Back. Thus, you have to click the button several times quickly to escape. Chrome's developers noticed this and added a flag to battle it. Enable it, and websites won't be allowed to write extra entries into your history unless you interact with the page. 6. Smooth Scrolling Search: #smooth-scrolling When you scroll a page using your mouse wheel, arrow keys, or touchpad shortcut, you might have noticed a jerky animation, especially if you have lots of tabs open. This flag will smooth out that stutter and make your scrolling nice and crisp. The Default setting on this flag seems to enable smooth scrolling. However, some claim that when you have many Chrome tabs open, the browser reverts to the clunky scroll format. So while you might not notice a difference with this one if you have a powerful PC, you can still give it a try if you like. Without smooth scrolling With smooth scrolling 7. Get Extra Warning About Insecure Sites Search: #enable-mark-http-as You've probably noticed that Chrome displays secure sites (using HTTPS) with a green padlock icon. Whenever a site uses an insecure connection (HTTP), however, Chrome doesn't use any colors. It displays a Not Secure message, but that's easy to miss. Set this flag to Enabled (mark as actively dangerous), and Chrome will feature that Not Secure text in red instead. It's a minor touch, but a good reminder not to enter any private information on insecure sites. Note that Chrome will always display a red warning icon on unsafe sites, like those with invalid security certificates. 8. Enable HDR Search: #enable-hdr HDR, or high dynamic range, is one of the latest advancements in display technology. It essentially makes colors richer by increasing the contrast and providing more colors to display. If you own an HDR monitor, you should take a moment to enable this flag so Chrome supports HDR content. It might not do a whole lot yet, but we'll surely see more support for HDR in the near future. 9. Easily Show Cached Websites Search: #show-saved-copy When you visit a website, your browser stores a copy of it in the cache. This allows it to quickly display the page without downloading everything again when you next visit it. Normally, when you try to access a website that won't load, your only options are refreshing and waiting. But if you set this flag to Enable, you'll see a new Show saved copy button. This lets you see the website as your browser last saved it, as long as you haven't cleared it. Of course, if the website isn't responding, you can't do much with it. But this will at least let you finish an article you were reading. 10. Show Autofill Predictions Search: #show-autofill-type-predictions You probably use Chrome's autofill all the time to populate fields with common info like your address. You can use a flag to take this handy feature a step further. Enabling it will pre-populate fields with your autofill text. 11. Automatically Reload Offline Tabs Search: #enable-offline-auto-reload If your browser goes offline and you have a ton of tabs open, you usually have to manually click each of them to activate and reload them. If you enable this flag, Chrome will automatically reload any offline tabs when you get back online. Use it with caution, as it could result in a heavy workload if you have lots of tabs open. If you prefer, you can disable this flag and enable a similar flag, labeled #enable-offline-auto-reload-visible-only. This will only reload offline tabs when they're visible. 12. Reduce Tracking Search: #disable-hyperlink-auditing It's no secret that all sorts of web entities love to track your browsing. While it's not one of the strongest ways to block trackers, you can set this flag to Disabled to turn off the sending of "hyperlink auditing pings." Every little bit helps. What Are Your Favorite Chrome Flags? We've looked at some of the best Chrome flags; now you have all sorts of new Chrome options to play around with. Google could easily remove any of these flags or add new ones, so keep an eye out if you're interested in trying more experimental features. You can also try the Chrome Beta for access to the latest features before they go mainstream. For more like this, our list of power user tips for Chrome on Android covers some handy Chrome flags for Android.

Opera is one of the few, major browsers to survive in a market dominated by Google Chrome. With consistent updates and a wide set of built-in tools you wouldn't find on others, Opera has managed to thrive. But Opera offers much more than what meets the eye. There are a host of other nifty features you probably don't know about. Here are nine of them. 1. Take and Annotate Screenshots Natively Screenshots have become an essential means of communication online. Opera users, however, don't need a separate app to take or edit one. They can do so right from the browser with the built-in Snapshot option. It can be triggered by clicking the little camera icon on the sidebar or pressing the Ctrl + Shift + 5 shortcut (Command + Shift +5 in macOS). You can either capture the entire screen or grab a portion of it. Once done, Opera will bring up a preview screen where you can easily edit the image, add text, arrows, the works. If you don't want to save the file, you can even copy and paste it anywhere. 2. Link and Quickly Access Your IM Chats Opera allows you to connect your instant messaging accounts to the browser as well. That lets you instantly access your conversations from the sidebar. It's compatible with a couple of popular services including WhatsApp, Facebook Messenger, Telegram, and VK. To link your accounts, you will have to first ensure your preferred platform is available on the sidebar. If it's not, head into the Settings and under Manage Sidebar, switch it on. Then, all you need to do is tap its icon and Opera will load the login screen. 3. Instant Search Opera also has a search shortcut if you want to look up something on the internet or jump to a tab. It's called Instant Search and it can be fired up either by tapping the search icon on the sidebar or pressing Ctrl + Space for tab search and Alt + Space (Option + Space on Mac) for web search. With Instant Search, you can execute a query on Google or search an active tab by switching modes which itself can be done by pressing the Tab key. In case Instant Search is not enabled by default on your machine, you can turn it on from the Settings. 4. Dark Theme If you've found Opera's design too bright for those late-night surfing sessions, there's some good news for you. The browser comes with a dark theme which you can enable from the Settings (Preferences on Mac). The setting is situated in the Appearance section. You can also do it through the Easy Setup button present at the top right corner in the new tab page. Switching to the dark mode revamps all the fundamental elements such as the bookmarks bar, settings page, and more. Want to enable night mode on all the browsers installed on your computer? Here's a quick guide to apply a dark theme on any major browser. 5. Smart Text Selection Opera has upgraded the usual text selection prompt with a few, additional handy extensions too. For starters, whenever you select a foreign currency amount, Opera will automatically convert it to your local one and show the result in the pop-up. Opera is even compatible with a handful of cryptocurrencies including Bitcoin, Bitcoin Cash, Ethereum, and Litecoin. In addition, you can do the same with time zones and units. From the Settings (Preferences on Mac), you can also specify which currency should it translate to. Although, at the time of writing this article, you can not tweak the resultant metrics for time zones and units. 6. Smart Tab Multitasking Just like you would with windows on your computer, you can cycle between tabs on Opera by using the Ctrl + Tab shortcut. But Opera takes this common functionality a step further by altering the switching order based on which tab you've most recently visited. It's not enabled by default, however. You will have to manually go into the Settings (Preferences on Mac) and in the User Interface section, activate the Cycle tabs in most recently used order option. 7. Connect Your Phone and Computer With My Flow For people who employ Opera both on their computer and smartphone, the browser has a continuity tool titled My Flow. My Flow allows you to seamlessly share content across Opera Touch and the desktop apps. You can push links, text, and even images. Plus, it's integrated into nearly every aspect of the experience. For instance, if you come across an image online you'd like to send to your desktop, you can simply right-click and click the My Flow option. Similarly, if you select a piece of text, Opera will bring up a My Flow shortcut in the pop-up menu. My Flow also doesn't need an Opera account to work. You just need to scan a QR code from your phone and you're set. 8. Navigate Faster With Gestures Apart from the keyboard shortcuts, Opera is compatible with mouse gestures as well. You'll need the right button for activating them. Hence, trackpads like the ones found on MacBooks aren't eligible for this. To utilize mouse gestures on Opera, you will have to first enable them from the Settings (Preferences). Now, after holding down the right key, you can perform a multitude of actions by moving the mouse in a certain direction. To go back a page, for instance, you will have to slide it towards the left. What's more, Opera also has something called Rocker Gestures. These are specifically for navigating backward or forward through pages. They're a bit more complicated to master than the normal mouse gestures. To go back, you will need to hold the right button, click the left one, and then release the former before letting go the second. For going forward, you will have to do the opposite. 9. Quick Access Pane Opera is filled with a series of thoughtful features but they're not enabled by default to ensure the user doesn't get overwhelmed at first. One of them is the Quick Access Pane. Turning it on reveals a new panel whenever you click the address bar which houses a bunch of nifty shortcuts you'd normally have to go through a few steps. There's a copy button, an option to save the webpage as a PDF document, and more. It's available in the Settings under Manage Quick Access. Is Opera Better Than Chrome? In spite of shipping with these supplementary features instead of forcing you to rely on extensions, Opera still performs well and doesn't stutter even under heavy duress. That's one of the many reasons why some of us also believe it's better than Google's Chrome. Here are some more advantages you can get with Opera.

If you've switched from Safari to Chrome on your iPhone, you'll find the layout quite different than what you're used to. It's not difficult to find your way around in Chrome, but the following tips will come in handy nonetheless. Note: The Chrome toolbar appears at the bottom in portrait mode and at the top in landscape mode. We use portrait mode below. 1. Add Webpages to Reading List Image Gallery (2 Images) Chrome has a Safari-style Reading List that allows you to save webpages for reading them later. To add a webpage to this list, when you have the page active, tap on the Share button in the address bar and then Read Later in the Share menu. The option also appears in the More Options menu (look for the ellipsis icon in the toolbar). In this menu, you'll find the Reading List option too. It leads to the list of webpages that you have saved for later. Chrome also allows you to add webpages from other apps on your iPhone to your Chrome Reading List. To access the Read Later option within another app, you have to enable Chrome in the app's Share menu. If you need help with this step, take a peek at our tips to master and expand your iPhone's Share menu. Once you make the required change and select Chrome while sharing a link, the Read Later option appears. Image Gallery (2 Images) It's a pity that Chrome hasn't implemented a "reader" view to give you a stripped-down version of webpages for easier reading, though. 2. Switch Tabs, Reload Pages, and More With Gestures Chrome makes your most-used browser actions painless with gestures. Switching tabs is as easy as swiping back and forth across the address bar. (If you want to jump to a specific tab, you'll have to use the card view or tab switcher button hidden behind the number icon in the toolbar. That number refers to the number of open tabs.) To reload a webpage, all you have to do is pull down the page and release when the Reload button shows up. See the New Tab and Close Tab buttons next to Reload? You can select them with this gesture instead by swiping left or right before you release your finger. You also have the option to swipe your way through the history of an active tab. Swipe from the left edge of the screen to go back one page and from the right edge if you want go forward. By the way, here's why you should use browser gestures in the first place. 3. Search With Your Voice Image Gallery (2 Images) After you open a new tab, tap on the microphone button embedded in the search box on the homepage. You can now ask Google to find web addresses and search for keywords with your voice thanks to the Voice Search feature. Of course, for the feature to work, you'll have to grant microphone access to Chrome first. Do so either when you're prompted, or from Settings > Chrome. If you already have a webpage loaded, you can trigger voice search via the Search button located right at the center in the toolbar. Tap on that button and you should see the microphone button above the keyboard that pops up. In the landscape mode, the microphone button appears directly in the address bar. You can also trigger a voice search from a third location, which we'll cover later on. 4. Scan QR Codes Image Gallery (2 Images) Your phone's Wallet app allows you to scan QR codes, and so does Notes. But Chrome speeds up this action a bit with its in-built QR code scanner function. The Scan QR Code button is hidden behind the Search button. (You'll find it next to the Voice Search or microphone button we mentioned above.) Although that's not the fastest way to start scanning a code. Try a Spotlight search for qr and you'll see Scan QR code as the top result. Better yet, keep the Scan QR Code button handy with the Quick Actions widget, which we'll discuss in the next section. 5. Add Quick Actions to the Today Menu Image Gallery (2 Images) When you install Chrome, it brings a couple of useful widgets to your phone's Today menu: Quick Actions and Suggested Sites. With the first widget, you can start a new search quickly. Plus, you can trigger the QR code scanning function, a voice search, and an incognito search. Of course, to make use of these functions, you'll have to add the Quick Actions widget to the Today menu. To do this, first tap on the Edit button in the Today menu. Next, tap on the green "plus" button next to Chrome---Quick Actions and then the Done button to wrap up. 6. View Tabs Open on Other Devices If you enter the tab switcher and swipe left to the Recent Tabs section, you'll find a list of the tabs you have closed recently. And below this list, you'll see all the tabs you have open on other devices. To view the contents of the second list, you'll need to sign in to Chrome with your Google credentials---you'll see a prompt to do so. This list comes in handy when you're away from your desktop or laptop and want quick access a tab you were viewing on that device. You can also access the Recent Tabs section from a second location: the More Options menu. 7. Use 3D Touch Actions Image Gallery (2 Images) If your phone supports 3D Touch, you can "long press" your way to a few important actions. For starters, open a new tab (even an incognito one) or close the active one by force-pressing the tab switcher button in the toolbar. Now try pressing the More Options button. When you do, you can slide your finger up and down the menu to highlight any option and then release your finger to select it. Pressing on the Search button in the toolbar gives you quick access to the Voice Search and Scan QR Code options. Want to jump from the current tab to a page you visited before? Press on the left arrow (or the Back button) in the toolbar to reveal the tab's history and then tap on the webpage you need. Likewise, press the right arrow and select an entry to move forward. You can also press the Share button in the address bar to reveal Copy and Paste and Go options. Chrome vs. Safari on iPhone: Why Not Both? Browser wars are pointless. There's no rule that says you have to stick to one browser. If you decide to use Chrome as well as Safari, you'll want to master both. If you're considering yet another option, take a look at our iPhone browser comparison.

Google Chrome is a fast and easy-to-use browser with a simplistic and minimalistic design. Many features have been added over the years to make your browsing experience easier and more enjoyable. Today we'll cover power user tips for making the most of Chrome's features and some extensions that will expand Chrome's functionality. 1. Try Out Chrome's Experimental Features Chrome contains many experimental features that are not enabled by default. These are features being tried out and some may make it into the main browser program. These experimental features, or flags, may not work perfectly and may be removed at any time. If they cause problems in Chrome, disable any flags you enabled. That should put things back to normal. You can use the Reset all to default button at the top of the chrome://flags page to change all the flags to their default settings at once. Several of the tips in this article involve changing flags, so our first tip shows you how to access them. Type "chrome://flags" in the address bar and press Enter. Use the Search flags box to find the flag you want to change. Each flag has a tag you can use to quickly access that flag. For example, the Save Page as MHTML flag can be directly accessed by typing "chrome://flags/#save-page-as-mhtml" into the address bar. Choose an option from the dropdown list to enable the flag or change the setting. Once you change the setting on a flag, tap the Relaunch Now button that displays at the bottom of the screen to finish applying the change. Some flags may require you to restart Chrome more than once for the change to take effect. 2. Prevent Videos From Automatically Playing Do you hate it when videos automatically play when you open a webpage in Chrome? There's an experimental feature in Chrome that can require user intervention to play videos on webpages. In the address bar, type “chrome://flags” and hit Enter. In the Search box at the top of the page, type “autoplay”. The Autoplay policy flag displays in the results. Choose Document user activation is required from the dropdown list. Click Relaunch Now for the change to take effect. If you decide you want videos to automatically play again, go back to the Autoplay policy flag and select Default from the dropdown list. Relaunch Chrome again. There are also some extensions that allow you to disable autoplaying videos in Chrome: AutoplayStopper - Prevents both Flash and HTML5 videos from automatically playing. Video Autoplay Blocker - Prevents HTML5 videos from automatically playing. HTML5 Video Autoplay Blocker - Prevents HTML5 videos from automatically playing. 3. Create Multiple Chrome Profiles Chrome allows you to create multiple profiles. Each profile stores apps, extensions, settings, browsing history, bookmarks, saved passwords, themes, and open tabs separately. So you can create separate profiles for work, hobbies, social media, shopping, and any other activity you might do in a browser. To access the Profile Manager, follow these steps: Launch Chrome. Click the Profile button in the upper-right corner of the window. Select Manage people. Selecting a profile on the menu opens that profile in a new window. Clicking on a profile in this dialog box also opens that profile in a new window, just like using the Profile menu above. To add a new profile, click Add Person. To create the new profile, follow these steps: Enter a name for the profile. Select an icon. If you're using Windows, and you want to quickly access this profile from a desktop shortcut, check the Create a desktop shortcut for this user box. You can then pin that shortcut to the Windows Taskbar. This option is not available in Chrome for Mac. Click Add. On a Mac, you can also switch profiles using the People menu. 4. Search Sites Directly Using the Address Bar You can quickly search many websites, besides search engine sites, from the address bar without going to those sites, if those sites are in your list of search engines. To search a site from the address bar, that site must be on your list of search engines. You must initially visit the site you want to add and then follow these steps. Perform a search on the site using the search box they provide. Once you have your search results, right click on the address bar. Select Edit search engines. To set up the site so you can search it using the address bar, follow these steps: Scroll down on the Manage search engines screen to the Other search engines section. Click the three vertical dots to the right of the search engine you want to set up. Select Edit. The search engine is already set up, but we want to assign a shorter keyword to type in the address bar, so enter a new Keyword and click Save. For example, we want to be able to type "muo" in the address bar to quickly search the MakeUseOf site. To search MakeUseOf, we type "muo" in the address bar and press Tab. The left side of the address bar now reads "Search makeuseof.com". We type our search term in the address bar and hit Enter. Search results for only MakeUseOf display on the tab. 5. Open Search Results From the Address Bar in a New Tab When searching using the address bar, you can have the results display in a new tab. This works when using your default search engine or when searching a specific site using the trick in the previous tip. Press Alt + Enter (Alt/Option + Enter on a Mac) after typing your search term. The search results display on a new tab and that tab becomes active. 6. Drag Text to Address Bar or Tab Bar to Start a Search If you want to use some text on a webpage in a search, there are two ways you can do that without having to type the text. Select the text and do one of the following: Drag it to the tab bar, next to the right-most tab. Your search results display on a new tab. Drag it to the address bar. Your search results display on the current tab. 7. Search Your Bookmarks Using the Address Bar Do you have way too many bookmarks? Having trouble find the ones you want? It's easy to search through your bookmarks using an extension called Holmes. Install Holmes and then do the following: Type an asterisk (*) in the address bar and hit Tab. Enter the word or phrase you want to find in your bookmarks. A list of bookmarks matching the search term displays below the address bar. Select the bookmark you want to open that webpage in the current tab. You can also hit Alt + Shift + H, or click the Holmes icon, to open the Holmes popup window and enter your search term there. You can also launch your Chrome bookmarks using keyboard shortcuts. 8. Search Your Google Drive Files or Gmail Account Using the Address Bar We've covered several tips to help you find anything in your Google Drive account. You can also search your files on Google Drive directly in Chrome, without first going to your Google Drive account. This tip allows you to search the Google Drive account associated with the current Chrome profile. If you need to search a different Google Drive account, either switch to a different profile or create a new one for that account. See tip #3 above. To add the ability to search your Google Drive account, you must add a search engine for Google Drive. To get to the Add search engine dialog box, do the following: Right-click the address bar and select Edit search engines. On the Manage search engines screen, scroll down to the Other search engines section. Click Add to the right. On the Add search engine dialog box, do the following: Enter a name for the Search engine, like "Google Drive". Add a Keyword that's quick to type, like "gd". You'll use this keyword to access this search engine. Enter the following URL as the URL with %s in place of the query. You can copy and paste the URL from here.https://drive.google.com/?hl=en&tab=bo#search/%s Click Add. To use the new search engine to search your Google Drive account, do the following: Type "gd" in the address bar. Hit Tab. Type in your search term and press Enter. Your Google Drive account opens on the current tab and files matching the search display. You can use this same trick to search your Gmail messages. Follow the steps above for adding a search engine, but enter the following on the Add search engine dialog box: Search engine: Gmail Keyword: gm URL with %s in place of query: https://mail.google.com/mail/ca/u/0/#search/%s Now you can search your Gmail messages the same way you can search your Google Drive files. The only difference is you enter "gm" in the address bar, rather than "gd". 9. Use Chrome as a Basic File Explorer in Windows There are many alternatives for Windows File Explorer, including Chrome. To use Chrome as a basic file explorer, type "C:\" in the address bar and hit Enter. All the folders and files on your hard drive is listed on the current tab. You can navigate around and even open files from within Chrome. 10. Perform Calculations Using the Address Bar If you need to do a quick calculation, you don't have to open the Calculator app on your computer or pull out your phone. You can perform simple calculations right in the address bar in Chrome. Type a mathematical equation in the address bar using standard operators, like +, -, *, /, %. For most search engines you would use as your default, like DuckDuckGo, Bing, and Yahoo, you don't need to hit Enter to see the result. It's displayed in a list below the address bar. But if Google is your default search engine, hit Enter to see a calculator with the result displayed. Even though it's not necessary with most search engines, you can press Enter after entering the equation in the address bar. Just like with Google, a calculator displays showing the result. It's a working calculator so you can use it just like the calculator included with the operating system. 11. Open a Specific Set of Webpages When You Open Chrome If you access the same set of webpages every time you open Chrome, you can set these pages to open when you load Chrome. The easiest way is to change an option in Chrome's Settings: Open all the webpages you want to open on startup in separate tabs. Type "chrome://settings" in the address bar and press Enter. Scroll down to the On startup section and select Open a specific page or set of pages. Click Use current pages. If you forgot about a webpage you want to add that's not currently open on any tab, you can also click Add a new page to manually add that webpage.

Learning a few keyboard shortcuts and navigation tricks is one of the best ways to improve your productivity. Used effectively, they are a lot faster than reaching for the mouse every couple of seconds. Shortcuts are especially useful when you're surfing the web. Traditionally, browsing web pages and navigating through tabs is very mouse-intensive. But it doesn't have to be that way. In this article, we're going to look at several browser shortcuts that everyone should know. Best of all, the shortcuts are browser agnostic. It doesn't matter if you use one of the best mainstream browsers, or a browser focused on privacy or even an open-source browser---they will still work! 17 Essential Browser Tab Navigation Shortcuts Make a note of these browser tricks, and you'll be a power user in no time. Note: On Mac, replace Ctrl with Command: Ctrl + 1 (through 8): Jump to the associated tab. Ctrl + 9: Jump to the last tab. Ctrl + T: Open a new tab. Ctrl + W: Close a tab. Ctrl + Shift + W: Close all tabs. Ctrl + Tab: Cycle through open tabs. Ctrl + Shift + T: Reopen the last tab you closed. Alt + Left Arrow: Return to the previous page. Alt + Right Arrow: Go to the next page. Ctrl + K: Place cursor in the address bar. Ctrl + R or F5: Reload the current page. F11: Toggle full-screen mode. Home: Jump to the top of a page. End: Jump to the end of a page. Space or Page Down: Scroll down the page. Shift + Space or Page Up: Scroll up the page. Ctrl + Save current page as a bookmark. If you'd like to learn more about keyboard shortcuts, we've got you covered. We've introduced you to the best Chromebook shortcuts, the best Windows shortcuts, the best Mac shortcuts, and more.

Most Chrome users are familiar with Chrome browser's flags that let you access experimental settings and---when set up correctly---help to improve your browsing experience. However, you might not know that Microsoft Edge also includes a flags menu. It's not openly advertised; Microsoft naturally doesn't want people to change a setting that could crash their system. But with a bit of guidance, you can become a master of Edge's flags. Like with Chrome, if you alter the right settings, you'll notice a significant boost in your surfing enjoyment. Let's take a closer look. Here are several hidden settings that will improve your Edge browser. How to Access the Flags Menu in Edge To access the flags menu in Microsoft Edge, fire up the browser, type about:flags into the address bar, and hit Enter. When the menu first loads, you'll only see two sections: Developer Settings and Standards Preview. To access the full list of flags, press Ctrl + Shift + D. You will need to restart the browser before any changes you make take effect. Warning: The settings in the flag menu are experimental and primarily aimed at developers. As such, they might not work as advertised and are liable to disappear without warning. Proceed at your own risk. 1. WebRTC WebRTC is an open-source project that allows websites to run real-time audio and video communication using peer-to-peer (P2P) communication. The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) is responsible for its standardization. In broad terms, it allows voice calling, video chat, P2P file sharing, and other related activities without the need for plugins or third-party apps. From a consumer standpoint, it has one flaw. By default, your IP address is visible to anyone who's connected to you. If you head to Developer Settings > Hide my local IP address over WebRTC connections, you can quickly remedy the flaw. 2. TCP Fast Open TCP Fast Open is an extension of the TCP protocol. In simple terms, TCP is a web standard that lets apps on your machine establish and maintain a network connection. It ensures the bytes exchanged are reliable and error-free. TCP Fast Open speeds up a TCP connection by using a cryptographic cookie to enable data exchange during TCP's initial handshake. It cuts out the original delay. As long as both the client and the web server support TCP Fast Open, you will see web pages load up to 10 percent faster. Some reports even claim the improvements could be as much as 40 percent. To permanently enable TCP Fast Open, go to Diagnostics > Networking > Enable TCP Fast Open and select Always on from the drop-down menu. 3. Render Throttling Render throttling is the first of two JavaScript flags we'll look at. Along with CSS and HTML, JavaScript is one of the three main languages used in web design. It's what allows web pages to be interactive. Sounds great. But the catch is that active JavaScript can be a significant drain on your battery life. If you're a tab junkie who often finds yourself away from a mains connection, the JavaScript could be responsible for a significant part of your battery loss. One solution is to enable the render throttling tab. Go to Diagnostics > JavaScript and mark the checkbox next to Allow the render pipeline to be throttled to improve battery life. 4. Low-Power Tabs The second JavaScript flag worth mentioning is the low-power mode for background tabs. It will improve the performance of your active tab. The tweak is especially useful when dealing with poorly-behaved pages. Too many sites come with JavaScript-heavy ads and endless analytics scripts. This setting will limit the amount of CPU power allocated to those tabs, thus speeding up your browsing and improving your battery life. To turn on the flag, navigate to Diagnostics > JavaScript > Allow background tabs to be put into low-power mode. Be aware that the setting might have adverse effects on tabs which need to run extensive background processes. For example, you might find notifications are delayed, or syncing doesn't occur as quickly as you expect it to. 5. Disable Microsoft Compatibility List Millions of websites use old technologies. You'll stumble across one every now and again. To see an example of what we mean, check out our list of websites from the 1990s that are still online today. If the underlying technology is too old, modern web browsers will not be able to display the content. To combat the problem, Microsoft developed a "compatibility list." If a site is on the list, Edge will adapt the code so it can display the page. But the list raises questions. How up-to-date is it? Is Microsoft checking the sites for updates? And what happens if a page has been updated but is still on the list? You don't want to use the compatibility list unnecessarily; some page elements might not display correctly if you do. To disable the list, go to Developer Settings > Use Microsoft Compatibility List. Yes, you might still stumble across an odd page that won't load, but if it's that bad, you probably don't want to waste your time with it anyway. How to Reset the Flags in Edge Have you gotten yourself into a jam? If one of the flags you've enabled has caused problems, but you're not sure which one is at fault, the easiest solution is to reset all the flags back to their default state and start afresh. Resetting the flags is easy. Enter the flags menu by entering about:flags in the address bar, and simply click on the Reset all flags to default button at the top of the window. Turn Off the Flags Menu in Edge Finally, let's quickly look at how to disable the flags menu. It will prevent people from accidentally entering the menu and changing your configuration. You'll need to use the Registry Editor---be warned that changing the wrong registry settings can have grave consequences for your system's stability. Double check that you're altering the correct values before proceeding, and always back up the registry before making any changes. Press Windows + R, type regedit, and press Enter. Next, navigate to this key: Computer\HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\Microsoft Right-click on Microsoft and go to New > Key. Call it MicrosoftEdge. Now right-click on MicrosoftEdge and once again navigate to New > Key. Call it Main. Highlight Main and right-click in the panel on the right-hand side of your screen. Go to New > DWORD (32-bit) Value and name it PreventAccessToAboutFlagsInMicrosoftEdge. Set the value to 1, and you're all set. To reverse the process, delete the newly-created PreventAccessToAboutFlagsInMicrosoftEdge value. Try the browser now and see if you can spot a boost in performance. Be sure to also master Microsoft Edge with keyboard shortcuts. It may not be your main browser yet, but Microsoft Edge is a capable browser with its own set of benefits.

Every browser has a zoom feature that lets you decrease or increase the size of a webpage. Apply it in the right places and it can make your browsing life much easier. It can improve readability for all of us and also make the web senior-friendly. Chrome also has the obligatory Zoom feature. But did you know that you can set custom zoom levels for each webpage with a bit of work? How to Manage Custom Zoom Levels in Chrome In Chrome, you can go to More > Zoom and change the size of text, images, and videos for one webpage or for all webpages. But you can also manage custom zoom levels that are specific to any site you visit. To manage them you will have to drill down into Chrome's Settings: Go to the website for which you want to set a custom zoom setting. Use the above controls (More > Zoom) to increase or decrease the page size. Set up custom zoom with any level for your most frequented sites. Now, go to Menu > Settings > Advanced Settings > Content settings > Zoom levels. This page will be displayed: Here, you will find all zoom levels and the domains they are applicable on. For now, you can delete a custom zoom level and set it from scratch again. There is still no control to help you manage the zoom levels from here. Also, you cannot add a webpage from here. Even then, it is a handy spot to delete a zoom level if it isn't working for you and set it again from the Zoom control. Chrome remembers each zoom setting and will calibrate itself automatically when you land on that specific site. That is handy enough.

You're reading this article in a web browser. But what if you wanted to get online without using a browser at all? Is it even possible? And why would you even want to? Web browsers are incredibly popular, even appearing on Smart TVs. But did you know that you don't need a browser to get online? While vital for browsing the web, browsers aren't completely necessary. It really depends on what you plan to do online. After all, the internet existed before the World Wide Web. Many other tools and protocols are available let you get online without a browser. Why Use the Web Without a Browser? It all sounds a bit crazy, doesn't it? Why on earth would anyone want to access the World Wide Web without a browser? Well, it's not as mad as you might think. Security and privacy: Perhaps your system is compromised. Viruses often limit how your browser can be accessed, and the sites you can visit. Alternatively, you may be unable to access the website you want to visit or download the file that you need. No browser: Your browser may not work. It could have been uninstalled; perhaps you never had one in the first placed (unusual, but not impossible). You'll need to know how to download Chrome (or your chosen browsing app) without a browser. Browser blocked: There is also a chance that your browser has been blocked from going online. Are parental settings running on your computer? Are you at work, attempting to get online when you should be working? If so, what follows is for advice only; you follow any instructions on this page at your own risk. Slow connection: This may impact your computer's ability to download HTML files. Perhaps adverts, or browser scripts, are slowing down your connection? Does the website time out, but hosts a file you need? Old PC with incompatible browser: Slow PCs also have trouble running modern web pages. This can either be a processing issue, or it might be a struggle for your existing browser to browse many popular websites. Downloading Files Without a Browser You have no browser, but need to download a file. Maybe you need to know how to install a web browser if you don't have one; perhaps it's something else entirely. You don't have a secondary device, and certainly, no way to transfer data from, say, a smartphone to your PC. How are you going to do it? FTP Perhaps the most obvious way to grab files is using FTP. You have two options here: one is a dedicated FTP client (like FileZilla). The other is to use the command line. Using Windows PowerShell and FTP to download a file is straightforward. Simply input the ftp command, then use: open ftp.domain.name When prompted to enter credentials, do so. Use the put and get commands to move data to and from the remote server. Need more? Type help in the PowerShell window at the ftp prompt. To use FTP in the Linux terminal, use: ftp domain.name You can also use the IP address of the domain, or if you need to log in: ftp [email protected] If you're then prompted to input a username and password, do so. When a connection is established, use the usual Linux commands to navigate through the file structure. Ready to download a file? Begin by setting the local download directory: lcd /home/user/yourdirectoryname Then simply use the get command: get filename wget wget is a native function in Linux (and can be installed using third-party tools in Windows and macOS). Ideal for downloading files and web pages, its usage is as follows: wget www.url-here.com/filename.fileext Various switches can be used to tweak a download, enabling you to download entire sites, grab files of a particular type, and much more. See our guide to wget for full details. PowerShell Windows PowerShell can also be used to download files. Right-click Start, and select Windows PowerShell, then enter the following: $WebClient = New-Object System.Net.WebClient $WebClient.DownloadFile("https://url-here/file","C:\path\file") This command can be used for files stored via FTP or a standard HTTP connection. If credentials are required, use the Invoke-Webrequest command Invoke-WebRequest -Uri https://www.url-here.com/ -OutFile C:"\path\file" -Credential "yourUserName" Note that a dialog box will appear for you to enter your username and password before proceeding. The download will only work if your credentials are authenticated. BitTorrent A more obvious approach, BitTorrent peer-to-peer file sharing is widely used. It's not limited to illegal downloads -- Microsoft, Canonical, Ubisoft, and others use it to distribute operating systems and software installer files. You'll need to use one of the file-grabbing methods listed here to get the .torrent file on your system, as well as the BitTorrent client. Once you've got that, however, you'll be ready to download the file. cURL Like wget, cURL can be used to download files from a website. curl -O https://url-here.com/file.name The -O option saves the file on your computer. Use -o and specify a filename to change the name: curl -o myfile.name https://url-here.com/file.name Meanwhile, multiple files can be downloaded by specifying them in turn. FTP is also an option via cURL: curl ftp://ftp.url-here.com --user username:password Windows users can access cURL in the PowerShell. Simply enter curl at the prompt, then enter a cURL instruction at the Uri prompt. Pre-installed in Linux, you can access cURL from the terminal in the same way. Install Software Without a Browser What if you need to install software without a browser, but don't know where to find it? FTP, wget and PowerShell are all useless without an address, so the alternative is an app store or package manager. App Store Both macOS and Windows have their own dedicated app stores, both of which can be reached from the desktop. As long as you are signed in with a valid account, you should be able to browse for, download, and install the software you want. Package Manager Meanwhile, Linux has the option of a package manager. This is a command line tool that provides text-based access to software repositories. While you need to know the name of the software you wish to install, the basic command remains the same on each occasion. However, the command will differ between operating systems. For example, in Ubuntu, the command would be: apt install package-name Meanwhile in Fedora, you would type: yum install package-name If your distro uses the RPM package manager, the following command will work: rpm -ivh package-name Stay in Touch With Social Media One of the most popular uses for a web browser is to access social media or email. Chat, too, is popular. Can you still use these services without a browser? Of course, you can. Email On your computer, you probably access your email in the web browser. Gmail is hugely popular, as is Microsoft's Outlook service. You know how you use an app on your phone to check your emails? Well, that's how it used to be on a computer, and still can be. Just load up your operating system's default email client, and enter the email account credentials. Seconds later, your emails will tumble into your inbox, without a browser! Newsgroups Usenet isn't as popular as it used to be, but it remains a resource with a loyal following. Discussion groups of many different topics can be read here, as long as you have a newsreader. While Usenet can be accessed via groups.google.com in a browser, a newsreader app is preferable. Mozilla Thunderbird can read NNTP, for instance; you might prefer a dedicated newsreader. RSS Similarly, RSS (Really Simple Syndication) is a tool that is less used these days. Around 10 years ago, however, it was vital for receiving updates from your favorite websites. It continues to have a purpose today, meanwhile, in serving podcasts to players and letting apps like Feedly grab the latest content from your favorite websites. Several RSS clients are available for desktop computers. Again, you'll need to know the exact URL of the RSS feed in some cases; having said that, apps are getting better at automatically finding the XML pages for RSS feeds. Chat Clients Finally, there's that most popular of online activities: chatting! Several popular chat services are currently used, such as Facebook Messenger and Skype. Many chat clients are available, and these bypass the World Wide Web to send the data direct to whomever you're chatting with. Check this list of chat clients for more information. Graphic-Free Browsing If you really have to access the web, it is possible to do so without a dedicated browser. This isn't ideal, but it is possible using command-line tools. Lynx Perhaps the most lightweight browser of them all, Lynx is a command line tool for Linux devices. It can be installed with: apt install lynx Once running, tap G to begin entering the URL of the site you need data from. Note that there is no support for Adobe Flash or JavaScript. This isn't the best solution, but it is a slightly easier way to find files to download if you don't know the direct URL. Telnet Another way to browse the web is via Telnet. It's possible to access Google using a command line. Linux and macOS users can do this natively; Windows users will first need to enable Telnet. Do this by clicking Start and entering control. Navigate to Programs > Turn Windows features on or off and scroll down until you find Telnet Client. Check the box, then OK and wait while the files are installed. You'll need to restart Windows. To access Google via Telnet, right-click the Start menu and open Windows PowerShell. Here, enter: telnet google.com 80 GET / HTTP/1.0 Host: google.com Tap enter again, and you'll gain access to Google. This isn't the best way to browse the web, of course, but you can use it to view individual web pages, if you know the URL. The GET command is all important here; this is a HTTP command, one of many. This list of HTTP commands should help. So Many Alternatives to a Web Browser! With your web browser out of action or otherwise unusable, you might have feared an end to your web usage. But in truth, the World Wide Web is only one aspect of the internet, and you don't even need a browser to get online. Sure, it makes it easier to engage with social networks and online stores, but these aside, other tools can overcome the lack of a browser, even if it's just to download the files to install a new one.

You're on Facebook. You see a clickbait title you can't resist. You click on it only to discover you have to click through 20 different pages just to see the whole article. Annoying, right? Luckily, there are a few easy to use tools out there that can quickly convert an annoying slideshow article into one convenient and easy-to-read page. Deslide With Deslide you can copy and paste the link into their website and choose from a variety of ways to have the page displayed. You can control the size of the image, and how much of the text you want displayed. Deslide actually makes things much easier for you by also providing a bookmarklet. Just drag the bookmarklet into your bookmarks bar and every time you come across an annoying multipage article, just click the bookmarklet and you can view the article on one page. This is one of the easiest to use and most consistent tools that we found to get rid of those annoying slideshows. Page Zipper PageZipper, which we've highlighted in the past, is another great option that offers a bookmarklet and a Chrome and Firefox extension. At the time of writing, however, it wasn't working with all the sites that we tested.

After simultaneously releasing several movies in theaters and on its streaming platform, Disney is granting an exclusivity window to the box office again. Simultaneous releases trigger a piracy surge, which becomes clear from a comparison between the 'Black Widow' and 'Shang-Chi' piracy numbers. During the COVID pandemic, studios including Disney, NBCUniversal, and Warner Bros have experimented with shorter release windows. In some cases, titles premiered on streaming services and at the box office at the same time. This is good news for consumers, who have more choice. However, movie theaters see these experiments as an existential threat. They believe that without exclusive windows, their revenues will tank. Exclusive Theatrical Window These concerns have now been heard, at least partially. A few days ago Disney announced that it will grant a 30 to 45-day exclusive release window for the remaining films set to release in 2021. This means that Disney+ “premier access” to movies will be shelved, at least for now. It’s not clear whether Disney’s decision was influenced by the pushback from movie theaters. The same is true for the impact of piracy, which was also widely cited as a concern. When films premiere online this generally means that a high-quality pirated copy will start circulating almost instantly. These are typically pirated more often than low-quality ‘Cam’ releases that come out of theaters. ‘Black Widow’ vs. ‘Shang-Chi’ We can illustrate this by comparing the piracy activity for “Black Widow” with that of “Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings.” Both are Marvel films released by Disney, but they used different release strategies. Black Widow was released in theaters and on Disney+, which meant that a high-quality pirate release was made available right away. Shang-Chi, on the other hand, had an exclusive theatrical window. While the film was pirated early, all copies are low-quality releases recorded from a movie theater screen. So how do these two compare? Below is an overview of the piracy numbers for both films, starting on the day of the premiere. These numbers are taken from a large sample of U.S. BitTorrent data, which acts as a decent proxy for the overall interest among pirates. Black Widow vs. Shang-Chi Piracy (*) The above clearly shows that Black Widow was pirated more. There was a massive surge from the start and, after the first 10 days, it was pirated four times more than Shang-Chi. The interest in Shang-Chi is decent but relatively flat. There was no massive surge, but that may still come when a high-quality release is eventually published. All in all, the above is in line with the expectation that pirates prefer to wait until a higher-quality copy is available. But did the lack of a high-quality pirate release for Shang-Chi result in more domestic box office visits? We can’t really answer this question with the data we have. After 10 days, Shang-Chi generated slightly more revenue at the box office. However, the first day was clearly better for Black Widow. Black Widow vs. Shang-Chi Box Office (*) The big question, however, is what the graph above would look like if Chang-Chi had a simultaneous release as well. Would the box office numbers be substantially less? This is the million-dollar question Disney has probably been trying to answer over the past few months. We don’t know if they have reached a conclusion yet but since the exclusive theatrical window is back now, we assume that simultaneous releases haven’t generated a windfall in extra profits. Even if Disney earned slightly more by getting rid of the release windows, which is possible, there are other long-term factors to weigh in. For one, the media giant has a great century-long relationship with theaters that it doesn’t want to throw away. In addition, the company might simply not like the fact that their flagship titles are instantly pirated in high quality. Finally, it’s worth noting that the numbers above are limited to the United States. Looking at the international picture, varying release strategies will complicate things even further. At this point, it’s too early to draw strong conclusions but it will be interesting to see how this develops over time. Are simultaneous releases mostly a side-effect of the COVID pandemic, or will we see more of these experiments in the future?