What Is My Browser
Identify your current browser session, check storage and graphics readiness, and review privacy exposure before sharing a support report.{{ summaryTitle }}
| Section | Finding | Detail | Copy |
|---|---|---|---|
| {{ row.section }} | {{ row.finding }} | {{ row.detail }} |
| Signal | Value | Support meaning | Copy |
|---|---|---|---|
| {{ row.signal }} | {{ row.value }} | {{ row.meaning }} |
“Which browser are you using?” sounds like a request for a name and version, yet most web failures depend on the current session as much as the browser brand. Window size, secure-context status, storage restrictions, graphics support, privacy settings, and extensions can make two sessions of the same browser behave differently.
A useful browser snapshot groups the evidence by the question being investigated:
- Identity: browser, version, rendering engine, operating system, platform, and user-agent clues help reproduce the environment.
- Site readiness: runtime APIs, storage, secure context, viewport width, and graphics support can explain missing features or fallback behavior.
- Privacy exposure: display, locale, hardware, connection, high-entropy client hints, and optional renderer detail make a report more distinctive.
Capability detection is narrower than full compatibility testing. Opening a WebGL context does not prove that a particular map or shader works. Seeing a service-worker interface does not prove registration succeeds. An available storage area now may still be cleared later by private mode, browser policy, or storage partitioning.
The capture conditions should match the failure. Resize changes responsive layouts; moving from HTTP to HTTPS changes access to secure-context features; switching profiles changes cookies and storage; enabling renderer detail adds graphics evidence while increasing fingerprint specificity. Compare working and failing sessions under the same conditions whenever possible.
Privacy preference signals also need careful wording. Global Privacy Control and Do Not Track express preferences or browser state; their presence does not prove that every site honors them. An exposure count describes how many groups of potentially identifying signals are present in this report, not whether anyone has identified or tracked the user.
Share only what the recipient needs. Browser and viewport details may be routine in a private support ticket, while a full user agent, time zone, hardware clue, connection hint, and GPU renderer can be unnecessarily specific in a public post.
How to Use This Tool:
Open the page in the exact browser profile, privacy mode, window size, and network context where the behavior occurs.
- Choose Support, Compatibility, or Privacy to emphasize the same captured signals for the current task.
- Select the compatibility target: general sites, sign-in and workspace apps, or media and graphics-heavy pages.
- Leave Include renderer detail off unless GPU-specific troubleshooting requires it. Turning it on adds a more identifying graphics signal.
- Read the support brief first, then use the readiness profile or signal ledger to locate the exact weak or exposed group.
- Repeat the capture in the working session under matching conditions and share the smallest useful difference set.
Interpreting Results:
The compatibility score is the weakest of five readiness groups, so one blocked group can control the overall band. Ready is 86% or higher, Caution is 57% through 85%, and Limited is below 57%.
Lower exposure means 0 to 3 of seven signal groups are present, Balanced exposure means 4 or 5, and High exposure means 6 or 7. These are local report labels rather than standards-body privacy ratings.
Confirm a suspected cause in the signal ledger and with a real site test. A readiness band cannot account for every browser policy, permission prompt, extension, server response, or application-specific requirement.
Technical Details:
The snapshot combines parsed browser identity with direct checks of runtime interfaces, storage access, viewport and screen values, secure context, graphics contexts, privacy preferences, connection hints, and optional high-entropy client hints. The IndexedDB probe creates a temporary database and removes it after a successful open.
Formula Core
Most readiness groups score the share of checks that pass, rounded to the nearest whole percent.
The overall compatibility score is the minimum of core runtime, storage and session, secure context, graphics path, and layout scores.
Rule Core
| Group | Rule |
|---|---|
| Core runtime | Percentage available across Fetch, AbortController, ResizeObserver, IntersectionObserver, modules, CSS Grid, and WebAssembly |
| Storage and session | Percentage available across cookies, local storage, session storage, IndexedDB, and service workers; workspace mode caps an insecure result at 57% |
| Secure context | 100 with secure context and clipboard, 71 with secure context only, or 29 without secure context |
| Graphics | 100 for WebGL 2, 86 for WebGL 1, otherwise 29 for a graphics target or 57 for other targets; Save-Data caps it at 57% |
| Layout | 100 at viewport width ≥ 360 pixels, otherwise 57 |
Privacy exposure counts seven Boolean groups: browser version or known engine, screen plus device-pixel ratio, locale or time zone, platform or hardware concurrency, connection hint, high-entropy client hints, and renderer detail when enabled and available.
The readiness chart adds a privacy-restraint value of 100 minus the rounded exposed-group percentage. That chart value is separate from the compatibility minimum and should not be read as a privacy guarantee.
Privacy Notes:
The snapshot is assembled from the current browser session and is not sent to a server for analysis. Local and session storage probes write and immediately remove a temporary key; the IndexedDB probe creates and deletes a temporary database when successful.
Copied or downloaded reports can contain a user agent, operating system, viewport, screen size, device-pixel ratio, language, time zone, hardware and connection hints, and optional renderer detail. Review those fields before sharing outside a trusted support channel.
Worked Examples:
Repeated sign-in prompts
A workspace-app check reports local storage blocked and IndexedDB unavailable. The storage group becomes the weakest score even when the browser is current. Retesting in the same profile without a restrictive extension or private window can show whether storage policy explains the lost session.
Graphics report for private support
A media page has no WebGL context, so the graphics score falls to 29 for the graphics-heavy target. Renderer detail cannot help when no context opens; the next useful checks are browser graphics settings, drivers, remote-session restrictions, and a real page test.
References:
- Mitigating Browser Fingerprinting in Web Specifications, W3C Privacy Working Group, 2025.
- Global Privacy Control, W3C Privacy Community Group.
- Secure contexts, MDN Web Docs.
- Web Storage API, MDN Web Docs.