It’s time to give Firefox another chance

If you're like me, you've changed your default browser before Chrome a few years ago and have never looked back. Chances are, before you've changed, you've used Firefox or - God forbid - Internet Explorer. What blocked Chrome was at that time its speed and simplicity, especially at a time when Firefox felt so much slower and heavier with each update. But times have changed. Now is the time to give Firefox another chance.

Earlier this week, Mozilla, the nonprofit organization behind Firefox, launched the first beta version of Firefox 57. This does not seem to be a big deal, but version 57 is the main version of Firefox for years. This is the culmination of years of work on many moving parts that the user never sees, but it allows the browser to quickly view your inbox, YouTube video or Gmail chat forum. To mark the fact that this is an exceptional version, Mozilla called this version "Firefox Quantum".

It's no secret that Mozilla has lost a lot of time and energy on different projects that are going nowhere (think it's a cell phone operating system, IoT services, creating a integrated video chat service, etc.). The organization was also caught in a political turmoil and it took a while to recover. It is not worth considering this. What matters is that Mozilla has found its furrow and is concentrating again - and it is beginning to appear.

In recent years, Mozilla engineers have been difficult for some of the projects that have finally come to fruition. The building stayed longer than expected (and maybe necessary), but with Quantum Mozilla now offers a browser that is worth reinstalling.

Many of Quantum's updates come from Mozilla's experimental servobuster. Servo was never released as an independent project, but was essentially the incubation space for the future of Firefox. This engine was written in Rust, a programming language developed by Mozilla for this type of application.

This means that, unlike previous versions, Firefox Quantum is now able to take full advantage of multiple CPU processors, especially when it comes to its CSS engine, which plays an important role in the speed at which a web page is reported. Typically, this also means that Firefox now uses much less memory (and often means that it will use less memory than Chrome).

The team also used this version to present a new interface. This means that the rounded tabs are, for example, gone. The new interface focuses on simplicity and speed. As a previous version, you can always change the interface with the desire of your heart, but this interface will now be very good in DPI screens and will work better on laptops with touch screens.

As before, Mozilla continues to celebrate Firefox with built-in support for Pocket. I appreciate that because I'm a big pocket user, but not everybody is happy with that decision. Firefox Quantum also features a built-in screen capture tool and a distraction-free playback mode.

I use the night version of Firefox for a few weeks, until this version, and the difference between these new versions and the old Firefox is day and night. It's fast and easy and I can just do it in my standard browser once the stable version is available.

I still have a few small handles, of course. Why are the scroll bars in Tweetdeck so ugly, for example? And why did not LastPass launch a compatible version of its plug-in for Firefox 57 beta (not how is Mozilla's fault, but users are not interested)?

Is Firefox Quantum much better than Chrome? No. But they are back on the parameters, and choosing a browser is often a very personal choice. Personally, I like the idea of getting a browser from an independent party. Until now, the compromise between a fast browser linked to Google and a slow, independent was not worth it to me. Now they are both comparable, this balance moves. Moreover, even if Mozilla did not look, competitors such as Vivaldi, Brave (from the former CEO run by Mozilla Brendan Eich) and others have emerged while Opera and others still hang there.

The final version of Firefox 57 should start on November 14th. Until then, you can get all the new features in the latest beta and developer releases.