Vivaldi CEO Jon von Tetzchner reaffirmed the company's commitment to human-centered web browsing, distancing the browser from the growing industry trend of integrating AI agents into core navigation features.
The announcement positions Vivaldi as a vocal critic of AI-driven automation in browsers, tools that, while marketed as time-savers, risk reducing user agency and exposing users to new types of security threats.
The statement comes amid a wider industry shift where major players like Google and Microsoft are embedding AI assistants (Gemini and Copilot) directly into browsers. These tools summarize content, prefetch actions, and can even traverse websites or fill out forms on a user's behalf. Vivaldi's leadership, however, sees this evolution not as progress but as a dangerous drift toward passive consumption and centralized control over how users experience the web.
Founded by Opera co-founder Jon von Tetzchner, Vivaldi Technologies has built its reputation on privacy, user autonomy, and extensive browser customization. Unlike competitors racing to position themselves as “AI browsers,” Vivaldi is taking a starkly different path, rejecting the integration of large language models (LLMs) for tasks such as summarization, chatbot support, or automatic form filling, at least until these systems can meet rigorous standards for accuracy, transparency, and safety.
This position echoes recent concerns raised by security researchers about the safety of AI-native browsing. Just last week, Guardio Labs published findings that agentic browsers like Perplexity's Comet can be easily manipulated by phishing schemes, fake storefronts, and prompt injection attacks. In controlled experiments, Comet failed to recognize malicious sites and proceeded to act on fraudulent instructions, purchasing products, clicking scam links, and even initiating malware downloads, all without user intervention.
The growing dependence on AI to mediate the browsing experience also carries broader implications for the health of the open web. Vivaldi's announcement references a Pew Research study showing that AI summaries significantly reduce click-through rates to original sources. This undermines the visibility of independent publishers, creators, and researchers, the very people who generate the content AI tools rely on. As AI agents increasingly intermediate access to information, the web risks becoming less diverse, less decentralized, and more susceptible to manipulation.
Vivaldi's critique isn't a rejection of AI in principle. Von Tetzchner acknowledges the potential for machine learning to enhance features, provided it doesn't compromise privacy or intellectual property. But he draws a firm line: Vivaldi will not implement AI features that disempower users, diminish the value of human exploration, or reduce engagement with original content.
Vivaldi remains one of the few browsers that explicitly rejects data monetization, maintains strong anti-tracking features, and allows deep customization. It is included in our list of the 12 Secure Browsers That Protect Your Privacy in 2025, and its recent integration with Proton VPN has further solidified its position as a top choice for privacy-conscious users.
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