Browser updates every two weeks: who's actually testing your website?

The samurai tests the contact form after every browser update, gauntlets on, on his phone. Since Chrome went fortnightly, we hear from a Mr Kkkkkkkkk twice as often.

The big browsers no longer ship a new major version every four weeks, but every two. Microsoft started with Edge 152 on 27 August, Mozilla followed with Firefox 155 on 1 September, and Google with Chrome 153 on 8 September.

What changes and what doesn't

Updates get more frequent, but smaller. Mozilla says explicitly that this doesn't mean Firefox ships twice as many features. Google cites security among its reasons: the gap between a fix landing in the code and reaching users should shrink. Chrome 153 shows why. According to heise (9 September 2026), the release fixes 230 security vulnerabilities, and for one of them Google was already aware of an exploit.

Corporate IT still gets an Extended Stable channel for Chrome and Edge, with feature updates only every eight weeks. Most visitors to your website, though, aren't sitting behind managed corporate IT. They get whatever ships.

Our view: the browser is rarely the problem

Browser makers are very careful not to break existing websites. What breaks is usually everything around them: a plugin that hasn't been updated in three years, a script that checks which browser it's talking to, a cookie banner fighting the form for the submit button. The more often the environment moves, the sooner that sort of thing surfaces. Provided someone is looking.

Usually nobody is. The site launches, gets celebrated and is filed as finished. From then on you depend on people reporting problems, and they don't. Visitors don't file bug reports. They tap "Send" three times, type "doesn't work" into the message field and ring your competitor.

So the two-week rhythm is no reason to panic, but it is a good excuse for a routine. In its Chrome blog post, Google recommends developers test their sites against the Beta channel. For most small companies something simpler will do: click through the two or three paths that bring in enquiries or revenue yourself, regularly. Before launch, we have the checklist in the Prüfstand for that. After launch, you need your own.

This week's drill

1. Write down the three most important paths on your website, for example contact form, appointment booking, checkout.
2. Go through each one completely: on a computer in an up-to-date Chrome, Edge or Firefox, and on a phone. Completely means until the confirmation email is in the inbox, not just until "Thanks for your message".
3. Watch the small things on the way: does the cookie banner load, can it be closed, does it cover anything?
4. Put the test in your calendar as a recurring appointment every two weeks. If everything works, it takes a quarter of an hour. If it doesn't, you'll know before your customers do.

And if Mr Kkkkkkkkk writes in afterwards: the form works.