Mozilla Firefox is a fast, light, secure and easy-to-use web browser that offers many advantages over other web browsers. It features all elements of modern browsing such as a tabbed interface, live bookmarks, private browsing, smart bookmarks, and much more. Furthermore, it has great performance, support for all major web standards, and includes special developer tools such as a JavaScript Error Console and a DOM Inspector.
Firefox was created in 2002 under the name "Phoenix" by Mozilla community members who desired a standalone browser, rather than the Mozilla Application Suite bundle.
Even during its beta phase, the browser proved to be popular with its testers and was praised for its speed, security, and add-ons compared to Microsoft’s then-dominant Internet Explorer 6. Firefox was released in November 2004, and was highly successful with 60 million downloads within nine months, which was the first time that Internet Explorer’s dominance was challenged.
Firefox was developed by Mozilla, a non-profit organization created in 1998 by members of Netscape (Firefox is considered the spiritual successor of Netscape Navigator), helping to keep the internet healthy, open and accessible to all. Firefox also comes in an ESR (Extended Support Release) version specially meant for large organizations such as universities and businesses. Firefox ESR is basically an older release of Firefox therefore it doesn’t include the latest features. However, it does offer install packages and a wide expansion of group policies and provides more stable and secure browsing than the standard version which is vital for enterprises environments and multiple deployments.
Firefox is available in five editions:
- Standard edition - The standard realese.
- Beta - A stable pre-release version of software. It includes new features that are being tested before being officially released in the next version. Beta edition is one version ahead of the standard release.
- Developer - A special edition tailored for developers and web designers, which has the same version as beta edition, but offers a separate profile that lets you run this edition as a seperate instances alongside other editions (standard, beta, and nightly), preferences tweaks for developers, dark theme by default, and allows to run unsigned extensions. It replaces the old Aurora channel.
- Nightly - Let you discover upcoming features and support for new web standards. Two versions ahead of the standard release (f.e. if the standard edition version is 115, the nightly will be 117), which makes it less stable than the beta edition.
- Extended Support Release - specially meant for large organizations such as universities and businesses. Doesn’t include the latest features as the standard edition.
Key Features:
- Easy Browsing
- Tab Management
- Speed and Performance
- Security and Privecy
- Thousands of Add-ons
- Open Source
Download Mozilla Firefox Standard
Download for Windows x64
Download for Mac OS X
Download for Linux x32
Download for Linux x64
All Downloads
Download Mozilla Firefox ESR (Extended Support Release)
Download for Windows x64
Download for Mac OS X
You can download unstable pre-release builds such as beta or nightly here. Pay attention that these editions send data by default to Mozilla and sometimes to their partners.
Last Update: September 05, 2024
Current Version: 130.0 (Standard)
License: Freeware
Languages: Multiple Languages
Supported Operating Systems:
Windows XP / Vista / 7 / 8 / 8.1 / 10 / 11 (32-Bit, 64-Bit)
Mac OS X 10.9 or later
Linux
Developer: Mozilla Organization
Homepage: Mozilla.com