Naver Whale

Naver Whale is the browser South Korea built for itself. Naver, the country's dominant search and portal company, launched it in 2017 as a home-grown alternative to Chrome, and it now accounts for close to 9% of all browsing in Korea and around 15% on mobile — fifth in the country, behind Chrome, Safari, Samsung Browser and Edge. It is Chromium underneath, so sites render as they do in Chrome, and most Chrome Web Store extensions install alongside Whale's own store.

What sets it apart is how much it packs around the page. Dual Tab splits a window into two linked panes, a sidebar holds web panels and extensions, Quick Search shows results for selected text beside what you are reading, and Papago translates whole pages and even images. Vertical tabs and tab groups are built in, and bookmarks, tabs and passwords sync between desktop and phone. In October 2026 Whale 5 added AI Chat, a sidebar assistant that answers questions about the page or the tabs you choose, organises tabs and edits your Naver Calendar after asking for confirmation.

The trade-off is that Whale is built around Naver. Naver is the default search engine, Quick Search and translation send text to Naver's servers, and the browser does not block trackers or fingerprinting — its ad filter only removes the intrusive ads Chrome also filters. Outside Korea, much of the value goes with the Naver services it connects to. If you live in Naver's ecosystem, it is one of the most feature-rich browsers available; if you do not, Edge or Vivaldi give you the same Chromium base with tools or protections that will suit you better.