20-06-2025
I loved this AI-first web browser, but experts warned me of ‘free' AI
'If you're not paying for the product, you are the product.'
Bogdan Onikiienko, an engineer at MacPaw, dropped that hard-hitting quote on me after using Dia, a new-age web browser that heavily relies on AI. He found it quite useful, but warned me that there are still a few unknowns, especially the privacy aspect.
The biggest tech reality of 2025 is that AI is here to stay. Dia is just trying to do something different with AI by putting it in various corners of the web browsing experience. AI giants like OpenAI are pushing agents such as Operator that can autonomously handle your web browsing tasks.
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Even smaller players like Opera and Perplexity are doing it. Google, the maker of Chrome, has even deeper ambitions with AI. In fact, one of the most futuristic reveals from Google I/O 2025 a few weeks ago, was the demonstration of Project Astra as a Universal AI assistant.
In the video, a person can be seen engaged in a freewheeling conversation with Google's Gemini AI, as it moves from identifying a nut on a bicycle and looking up a product manual, to finding a bike shop listed nearby on Maps, and then ordering a dog basket. All of it happened in the background.
The overarching idea is that you have an assistant in your hands that can perform everything from a web search to trawling social media. Now, take off the voice chat element and implement the fundamental formula to create a semi-autonomous browsing experience for your desktop. That's essentially the concept behind the Dia browser.
What makes Dia stand out?
In its simplest form, Dia is a web browser with an AI agent in the sidebar, and a dash of behavior-learning chops for extra personalization. After months of closed-circle testing, it has finally come out of the beta phase. And so far, my journey has been pretty smooth-sailing. A bit familiar (to the eyes seeing Gemini seeing everywhere across Google products), but no less meaningful.
It's surprisingly snappy and, despite its beta status, hasn't crashed once. Dia is built atop Chromium, the same engine that powers Chrome and Edge. The benefit? All your browsing data and extensions will seamlessly port over on first setup. So, what truly sets it apart? The AI companion.
Look, I know there's more hype around AI tools than their perceived benefits. Makers of Dia, The Browser Company, know that all too well, and it's not promising any universe-shattering advancements either.
On the contrary, the AI agent simply acts as a wrapper for basic tasks that would otherwise require you to open another tab (or app). And it does it all in a sidebar, using some clever extensions that you can create as per your liking.
Here's an example. I was reading the reviews of Samsung Galaxy S25, Google Pixel 9, and iPhone 16 across three tabs, trying to find the right phone under my $800 budget.
Switching back and forth was a hassle, so I summoned the tabs command in the AI chat, asked it to create a table comparing all three, and help me pick the right one. I got my answer in about three to four seconds. By the way, whatever answer you see in the AI chatbox, it can be copied (as text or even an image), and down the road, integrations with other services will allow importing, as well.
The AI in Dia browser is about easing the mundane tasks, and it has been integrated rather seamlessly. When you are browsing any content on the web, and select an item, it is pulled into what you can call an AI brain.
For example, I was reading about an impending ban on social media for children in Australia, but didn't know the background. I simply selected the first sentence of the story, and wrote 'what happened' in the AI field.
Dia's AI pulled context from the article, performed a web search for related stories, and provided a detailed background on the events with citations without ever opening another tab or window. For quick reference, glancing information, or background checks, this feature is astoundingly helpful.
Thomas Raysmus, an AI Researcher at hosting and website builder platform Hostinger, tells Digital Trends that AI-driven web interactions can eliminate repetitive tasks and enhance the human intent, but warns that we are still at the early stages of this internet shift.
'These tools must be transparent, privacy-conscious, and give users full control. If AI agents are built with clear boundaries and user trust at the core, they won't just be helpful, they'll become indispensable,' he adds. Interestingly, Hostinger launched a no-code AI-powered web app builder earlier this year.
From mundane to meaningful
Of course, Dia's AI can also do the usual Apple Intelligence / Writing Tools stunt, such as correcting grammar, style adjustment, and more. Think of it as an AI that knows, in real-time, what's happening on the screen and across different tabs. A recurring element is that it will save you the extra click or the copy-paste hassle of dealing with another AI tool in your browser.
While shopping, it can summarize reviews and tell you to avoid a bad product, help pick the right dish at a restaurant based on customer anecdotes, and perform other such tasks. Again, fewer tabs, easy work.
Aside from text, Dia can also handle images thanks to a native screen-grab tool in the AI sidebar. Think of it as Google Lens, but one that works faster.
Now, the AI in Dia is not perfect, which makes sense for a product still in the beta phase.
While reading an article, I highlighted an event and asked it to tell me about it by using credible news outlets as the source. It did a fine job by picking up sources like BBC and The Guardian, but at least two of the citations also included Wikipedia, which is neither 100% reliable, nor a news outlet.
Talking about getting work done, you're still in control. So, let's say you want to summarize information from just three out of the six active tabs. An '@' shortcut, followed by the tab's name, will get the job done.
I love the skill system, in particular. Think of it as creating a custom GPT, or Gem, for your web browsing. All you need to do is use a '/' command to summon any of your skills. And creating one doesn't take any coding knowledge. Just describe what it has to do, and you're good.
As a journalist, researching content is part of my daily job. So, I created a skill called 'Expand' that essentially picks up the word I select on a webpage and performs research by focusing on science papers and news outlets.
Once the research is over, it gives me a detailed explanation. I never have to leave the current webpage, and neither do I have to type a long question in an AI chat box. I just select any text or paragraph I want, type '/expand,' and Dia's AI will pull answers for me.
It sounds convenient, but at each step, I am also acutely aware of the risks. Is AI also making us lazier and dumber? According to an MIT research that came out earlier this year, ChatGPT users 'consistently underperformed at neural, linguistic, and behavioral levels.'
Do I need so much AI in a web browser?
AI has its practical charms, but the risks are also diverse. Dia is a clear showcase of AI easing the web experience for an average user, like me. The viewpoint of experts, however, varies depending on which element of the AI-driven web browser experience they can relate to the most.
Dia takes a rather modest and practical route to putting an AI assistant in your web browser. It's not perfect, and some challenges will be insurmountable. For example, Google likely won't allow Dia's AI to access the entire Workspace (Gmail, Docs, Drive, Calendar, etc.) with the same kind of depth as Gemini.
Lei Gao, Chief Technology Officer at SleekFlow, says the benefits are obvious, such as saving time and filtering the right information. Gao, whose company offers AI-powered social commerce tools, warns that wrong AI implementation in web browsers can complicate things and erode user trust.
'People are information-overloaded, and LLM agents can figure out what's important earlier. But not all things have to be simplified. The value comes when automation cuts out drudgery, not when attempting to think on behalf of someone,' he told Digital Trends.
Shoe-horning AI deeply into the web browsing experience will come with a few compromises, such as over-simplification, missing source nuance, and too much summarization. In a nutshell, users will eventually turn into muted viewers of filtered information.
The biggest challenge is just how much control we can give to AI agents. 'Attack surface is increased when AI agents can tap into real-time browsing information,' Gao tells me. At the end of the day, does an average person know (or trust) the privacy rules, data usage policies, and their sensitive details with a product like Dia and its agent?
If AI does too much thinking for us, we lose our knack for challenges and problems. The experts at Carnegie Mellon University and Microsoft arrived at a similar conclusion a few months ago. 'Higher confidence in GenAI is associated with less critical thinking,' said their collaborative research paper.
In a nutshell, there is a cognitive decline, or as the research says, a cognitive debt to pay. As tools like AI overviews and chatbot-ification of Google Search change how we look up and find information on the internet, the core experience is changing dramatically for hundreds of millions of users across the globe.
Instead of clicking links and reading through articles, users now directly find the answer to their question. In doing so, they miss out on the valuable context that makes an article, and also stand at the risk of consuming information that is hallucinated or presented with the wrong context by the AI.
AI: The carrot and stick situation
Brian Reed, a senior executive at cybersecurity firm Cymulate, tells Digital Trends that with the advent of AI in web browsers also come risks such as prompt injection, data poisoning, and credential exfiltration. The deeper a workflow gets, more are the chances of a bad actor striking.
The Browser Company says Dia stores chats, history, bookmarks, browsing context, and files on your device, and that too, in an encrypted form. The company also assures users of data anonymization, secure deletion within 30 days from servers, and a strict policy to disallow partners from misusing user data.
When it comes to AI, there is a whole new world of privacy scares we need to contend with. A lot of companies have made tall promises — such as Google and Meta — and we all know how it turned out.
Experts warn that the risks are high and multi-faceted. AI can shape a person's viewpoint, and not always in the right direction. What if an AI misinterprets information or makes things up? Merely a few weeks ago, an American lawyer was sanctioned after they cited made-up court cases generated by ChatGPT.
Of course, there's a price to pay for serious convenience, some of which are beyond Dia's control. The 'AI makes us dumber' debate is one of them. In a nutshell, you, as the customer, choose where to put your trust. Dia and its AI-driven web promises are just another evolution. At the end of the day, it's a leap of faith.
