A browser and an Internet connection is more than enough to view your favorite websites, but you will not always have access to the Internet. You might have to go to a area where there is no Internet access or may be on a flight. In such scenarios, an offline browser will help by indexing all your favorite websites and saving them in your PC.
You can browse the websites just like you normally do, including all the images, styling and even the ability to access internal links. Of course, the website content will only be updated to the time you used the offline browser to index it. Without further ado, let’s check out the 5 best free offline browsers.
1. HTTrack Website Copier
HTTrack definitely deserves the first mention for its multi-platform support and robust tools to manage what to index. It is extremely simple to use with step-by-step processes to help you index and download content of your favorite website, plus it has support for JavaScript.
If you already downloaded a website, you don’t have to download it again to get the latest updates. There is a simple update button that will let you update your website by downloading just the latest content. If you have any trouble understanding anything, HTTrack has a built-in help system to guide you with almost any issue.
Compatibility: Windows, Mac OS X and Linux
2. WebAssistant Proxy Offline Browser
WebAssistant Proxy Offline Browser doesn’t actually index any websites on demand; instead it will save all your browsed pages in your PC to view offline later. When you visit a website, it will index that page and save it in your PC and will continue doing it while you are browsing. Whenever you revisit a page, it will be loaded from the offline source, not the actual page.
This can be very handy if you want to revisit any particular websites offline. Furthermore, it works very easily. All you have to do is turn it on, and it will automatically save and open webpages for you; there is no need for manual intervention.
Compatibility: Windows, Mac OS X and Linux.
3. Hooeey Webprint
Hooeey Webprint is quite similar to WebAssistant Proxy Offline Browser, but instead of indexing the page, it takes a screenshot of it. This method has its own advantages and disadvantages, and some people will surely prefer it.
With the screenshot method, you are only able to view the page; you can’t interact with it in any way. However, it also shows the exact copy of that page, including advertisements, exact styling and all types of images that standard indexing may miss. Furthermore, it can also bypass websites robot.txt files that can prevent indexing.
Compatibility:Windows, Mac OS X and Linux
4. Cyotek WebCopy
Cyotek Webcopy works just like HTTrack, moving from link to link it indexes and saves all the website content in your PC’s hard drive. However, it doesn’t support JavaScript, so if a website depends on JavaScript too much, it will not be able to properly index it.
It might not have the most hand-holding interface, but it is definitely easy on the eyes with colorful visuals. You can set up different rules to limit indexing search of the tool, and you can even access password-protected websites.
Compatibility: Windows
5. BackStreet Browser
BackStreet Browser is a very simple and fast offline browser that will index almost everything on a website, including HTML, Java Applets, sound, graphics, styling and all other files. It uses a multi-threading download system to download pages faster and compresses them to zip format for smaller size (if required).
It has a very intuitive interface with easy to follow menus. You can add different filters, such as URL, size, text, last modified, etc., to limit website indexing. Furthermore, it also offers the ability to resume the last downloaded data and to update downloaded websites.
Compatibility: Windows
Conclusion
Above are some handy offline browsers to save your favorite web pages for offline viewing. They all have a different way to index a website, so you can choose according to your needs. BackStreet Browser is a simple and powerful tool for this purpose, but if you want more features, then HTTrack Website copier will be a better choice.