MacSurf browser

MacSurf is a Desktop web browser that runs on Mac OS Classic. It's a brand new browser; it hasn't even been out for one year.

MacSurf is a modern, standards compliant web browser that runs on Classic Mac OS 9. It has implementations of modern browser features, including CSS3, ES5 JavaScript, PNG images with Alpha, TLS, and more. It is a NetSurf fork with a Mac OS 9 frontend.

Mac OS 9 is a very old operating system; it runs on G3 and G4 Macs, which were released around 25 years ago and have very modest specifications compared to what is available these days. Until the release of MacSurf, there were no web browsers that could access the modern internet in any functional way. MacSurf lets you browse the web on those old G3 and G4 computers. Classilla used to be a web browser for Mac OS 9 that had a developer community around it, keeping the project alive but it shut down in 2021. If you have an old Mac, MacSurf is a good way of using it online.

The development of MacSurf is very interesting; it was built for Mac OS 9 using tools from the same era; that means CodeWarrior, Carbon, QuickDraw, Open Transport, and using Apple's Carbon API. And it is a proper browser; it doesn't rely on server side rendering to access HTTPS sites (older verisons used to use their proxy service, and this is not really needed any more as macTLS works well).

It's obviously a niche browser, but for people who just love their old Macs, and who like to see things like this, it is a fantastic project.

Features

• CSS3
• CSS Grid
• CSS custom properties
• ES5 JavaScript
• PNG image support, including alpha transparency
• TLS
• And much more

Full CSS Status