Kind of a big update… this is the last version of Firefox for Windows 7 and Windows 8, along with macOS 10.12, 10.13, and 10.14. I know this is forcing family members to finally upgrade their (mac) OS.
More big updates:
- Hardware video decoding is now enabled for Intel GPUs on Linux.
- We’ve refreshed and streamlined the user interface for importing data in from other browsers.
- The builtin editor now behaves similarly to other browsers with contenteditable and designMode when splitting a node, e.g. typing Enter to split a paragraph, and also when joining two nodes, e.g. typing Backspace at the start of a paragraph to join the paragraph and the previous one.
Pretty sure that last feature is what finally fixes the Reddit Fancy Pants editor in Firefox… exactly when Reddit is destroying itself.
- IndexedDB is now also supported in private browsing without memory limits thanks to encrypted storage on disk. The temporary keys to decrypt the information are hold in RAM only and all stored information is purged at the normal end of a private browsing session from disk.
This might help WhatsApp web run in private browsing, among other sites.
The most impactful thing is definitely going to be OS compatibility… this is going to be the last version of Firefox for a long time for a lot of people.
I have 3 Windows x64 machines:
- i7 6600u | 16GB RAM | Intel HD 520 | Nvidia 940MX
- i7 7700HQ | 16GB RAM | Nvidia 1060 (integrated Intel GPU disabled in BIOS)
- i7 9850H | 32GB RAM | Intel UHD 630 | Nvidia Quadro T2000
Firefox 115 running flawlessly on all of them. No issues, fast and smooth. Same as previous versions.
Can someone explain the Intel h264 decoding thing?
I’ve had h264 decode on GPU working with VAAPI since forever. This seems to be telling me about a feature I already had years ago?
edit: culprit found: dashlane extension for firefox causing latency and high use of resources… dashlane claims they are waiting on mozilla to review their patch submitted 3 weeks ago:
I am not seeing any patch submitted to Mozilla by Dashlane on this bug which looks like it is at an investigation phase, is that in a separate bug?
Been enjoying Edge for a year, but always appreciated FF for it being it’s own thing. Worth a shot?
Definitely. Check out our switching guide for some tips.
I use edge at work (nothing else available), Firefox everywhere else.
It would be nice if more add-ons were supported on mobile, desktop is great.
I genuinely think the web has become horrible enough where the browser you use does not really matter from the technical perspective.
It does, however, incredibly important to have more than 1 engine competing, as currently Firefox is the only mainstream browser not built on chromium/google.
Certainly. It’s really important to have as many people as possible using a different browser engine (Gecko) in this Chromium-dominated world.
And … uBlock Origin works the best on Firefox (https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock/wiki/uBlock-Origin-works-best-on-Firefox).Firefox was great, went to shit for a couple of years, and is now back to being great again. I’ve heard it’s much easier on memory as well.
It’s one of the few non-chromium browsers left, so you should definitely try it because Google is trying to make their own standards with chromium.
It’s literally the only non-chromium browser left other than Safari. That’s why it is critically important that Firefox maintain a presence
