Firefox: Private, Safe Browser 17+

Decent browser. Good privacy. Mediocre UX

I use Firefox on my desktop every day and love it, best browser that combines power with privacy. On mobile it is not quite as appealing. It does just fine at being a browser, and the built-in privacy features are nice, but the UX falls a bit short. For example, when closing tabs, if you close the currently highlighted tab in the list it after re-opening the app for the first time, it scrolls all the way to the top of the list of tabs, and you have to scroll all the way back to the bottom to see your recent tabs. Also, the action button is in the top right, small and hard to get to, but contains actions that I use frequently (e.g. find text on page). The east to hit button in the bottom right I don’t use very often, even though it has a prime spot on the screen. Hopefully this can be addressed, I’m still using it because I like having the same browser for desktop and mobile, but it can be annoying sometimes.

Developer Response ,

Hello! The app has been significantly improved since you shared your review with us. We hope you’ll try it again and let us know about your experience!

Horrible User Experience

I have used Firefox on and off now for a span of seven years, and I keep checking in to see if they fixed their terrible bookmark UX, and I am disappointed every time. Let me go into detail. For as long as I can remember, the most frustrating aspect of mobile Firefox is accessing bookmarks. Too many taps!! There should be a library icon on the navigation bar at the bottom, you tap ONCE and it shows you your bookmarks. More specifically the user should be able to customize what bookmarks they want to see right up front. For me, all my bookmarks live in the Bookmarks toolbar. I never put bookmarks into the Bookmarks menu - I mean, does anyone? Second point, right now when you tap the menu and tap “Your Library” it slides up this pane which displays your bookmarks, great - however, it’s super annoying to dismiss. If you don’t land your finger exactly on the right spot and swipe down, you end up swiping something else. There should be a “Done” element or some other way to dismiss that pane other than swiping. Even tapping on the gray swipe element to dismiss would be ok. I really love what Mozilla is doing with Firefox, with emphasis on security and privacy, but their UX/UI needs some serious attention. Even the desktop browser looks dated and has issues. These things wouldn’t bother your average user that much, but as a UX/UI designer myself - it grinds my gears.

Developer Response ,

Hello! The app has been significantly improved since you shared your review with us. We hope you’ll try it again and let us know about your experience!

Needs some clean up.

I been using Firefox and it’s relatives such as Sea Monkey and so forth since they were first made available to the Public and in many cases in alpha/beta back than and in time on most all platforms supported officially or not. During my career I became a huge privacy advocate. That said, I have to seriously question any company/organization who professes to be a privacy supporter and who puts services in their products from companies like Google and others. It has been many years now Google stated they do or will know you better than you do yourself (anyone that uses Google services willing or not). To better understand what is meant here read Google’s privacy policy, make note to where it says they record everything created on/through their services including email received in gmail and sent from there. Additionally, it defies logic why again any company claiming to support privacy would add support to their products to track your physical location and last I checked it is on by default (geo might not exist on mobile or it is hidden). I expect this from M$ since all their spying mechanisms are on by default (windows 10) and there are many, some cannot be turned off completely. Back in the beginning of Firefox I do not feel the development team would have ever added such things.