A writer swapped Chrome for the AI browser Dia for a week

A tech writer at How-To Geek spent a week using Dia instead of Chrome, and the main finding is simple: Dia lets you ask an AI questions about the pages you already have open. Nimrah Chaudhry tested it because Arc, another browser, is winding down and recommending Dia. She did not expect to switch, but she came away with some clear points.

Easy to start

Dia imported her Chrome profiles, passwords and bookmarks within minutes. Her tabs moved to a sidebar instead of a strip across the top. She disliked that on day one. By day two or three she had stopped noticing. Dia says it does not sell user data or use it to build advertising profiles. She saw no ads during the week.

Set your search habit first

Dia decides whether what you type in the address bar goes to Google Search or to Dia Chat. That disrupted her routine. She fixed it under Settings, then Advanced, then Address bar, where she set Google as the default. The down arrow still switches to Dia Chat when she wants an AI answer.

What it did well

• She could mention one or several tabs in a chat and ask about them, with no copying into another AI tool.
• She uploaded nine screenshots and Dia wrote alt text (short image descriptions for screen readers) for all of them, following her guidelines.
• Asked for a general report on her published articles, it found three small errors: two typos and one reused caption.
• Custom shortcuts called Skills let her save prompts, such as /feedback, and reuse them.

Email, calendar and limits

Using @ mentions, Dia summarized her unread emails, found a person's email address in her inbox and helped draft a message. It asked permission before touching her calendar, Gmail, Photos and other services. It could show her schedule but could not create an event. It gave her a template and steps instead. With Google Photos, it first said her library was empty, and later it could read only a photo's metadata, not see the image.

What to do

For anyone who keeps many tabs open for work, this kind of browser may save some switching between tools. Before trying it, check which services you let it reach and set your default search engine. The writer still starts research with Google, official documentation and original sources. The text provided cuts off before her final verdict.