What do you think about the new menu of Firefox Android?
IMHO it's definetly a hard break with the past design.
But it looks more mature and not as 'shy'.
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Comments90IMHO it's definetly a hard break with the past design.
But it looks more mature and not as 'shy'.
It moved the back/forward arrows to the top of the screen where I can barely reach. Why ?
yeah back/forward refresh & share should be at the bottom of this menu
I like it. :-) It always amazes me, that so many people who like free and open software, are so negative about changes. If you really want things your way, then support the software, ad your skills, pay for it, so that the best people can work on it. A little more gratitude for peoples free work, to provide you with great and free software, would be in order.
I hate it. It used to be two taps to open a new tab.
Now it's four taps:
Open the menu
Close the menu
Open tabs
[+]
My muscle memory ain't going nowhere.
In defense of Mozilla on this one, the new tab button has been in tabs for years now, and it kinda makes sense to be there.
If they're trying to streamline menus, getting rid of a redundant button is a good start.
You can long press the tab icon to open a new tab. Still 2 taps.
Or tap the tab icon and then the plus icon in the bottom right.
Although I did mainly use the menu method. Will just have to change now.
IMO 2 taps is already one too many
Or just tap + when you enable the toolbar redesign in Nightly.
I miss the toolbar that was experimented with for a while in Nightly that had both the new tab button and the forward button visible at all times. But apparently other people hated it.
I still have that, but with the tab bar.
Edit:
Ah neat, is that on a tablet? Maybe it's decided that my phone screen is too small.
Phone acting as tablet. Settings "smallest width" to 600dp or more triggers tablet mode on Android, which changes certain UI elements to, in my opinion, make more sense on average near 7" smartphones. At least for me as I am a landscape-first user.
So, since I already screwed up my homescreen layout by toggling this now, I'll give you screenshots to compare between 423 (smallest in regular settings) and 705dp (what I use). 423 on left, 705 on right.
Took me longer than I anticipated, but anyway:
Sorry for the JPEG, original was 18MB.
Notice the difference in keyboard layout, and 3 button navigation with app icons and app drawer.
You should be able to click the image to open it, at least on LemmyUI.
I appreciate the effort! (Indeed looks like that wasn't quick to put together.) And yes, that looks like you get a bunch more controls on your wider phone.
you can still open a tab with two taps
I completely forgot there was a new tab entry in that menu
In latest Nightly there is a + sign right of the address field. So, it is only 1 tap now.
i don't mind it, i think it looks good - BUT i just want a tablet ui with a tab bar T_T
For whatever it's worth, you can enable a movable tab bar in Firefox Nightly for Android.
This will force the tab and omnibar to the top of the screen, however.
Don't forget this too
Woah I was literally just commenting that I miss that expanded toolbar layout. Unfortunately that option isn't visible yet in my Nightly, but this indicates that it might not be gone forever, awesome!
Edit: Just enabled Secret Settings and now I have back my beloved toolbar! It's a bit chunkier than it used to be, but still neat.
Edit 2: ah, and no back/forward buttons, that's a shame. I'd prefer those over the bookmark button.
Yep, bookmark feels like something no one needs with any regularity.
In the Secret Settings it was named something like "Composable toolbar", so perhaps we'll get the ability to customise the contents later.
It's just because it's the toolbar rewritten in Jetpack Compose rather than the old one which was written with XML and used a custom parser.
Ah! That makes sense
Neat! seems I need to update!
There's also some new secret settings for the new toolbar.
Ah! That may be why I don't see it 😓
I want to import/export bookmarks to HTML and view page source/inspect element in addition to that
You can add
view-source:before the URI to view the source.Oh, that's nice. Thanks!
There is also an extension for this
It's already not only in Nightly, but Beta too, so probably soon in release.
They half assedly implemented it without porting over all features, which is annoying but definitely the Mozilla way.
And Beta.
I just changed it back right when I figured out how.
This is my day 2 of trying Firefox on Android (coming from Opera), so it's not like I was already used to it.
About Firefox Nightly -> Tap the FF logo a few times -> Secret settings -> Enable menu redesign off
Thank you. I don't hate the big buttons, but they put the most important ones on the top out of reach frommy thumb. Dumbest decision ever.
If you are not interested in testing the new features why are you using nightly version?
Release doesn't even have tab bar yet.
Beta does, but only has the new menu and homepage doesn't count as tab like on desktop and doesn't support DoH, like on desktop.
Nightly is most feature-complete.
But I'll have to figure out how to check existing and report new bugs. Search may not work when I hit enter, opening links with Firefox just opens the homepage, only when I click back does it actually open the link, screenshots sometimes don't work, but only after I go to tab menu and then back, and the bottom-most thing in homepage is cut-off, so I use the stories as padding (might be related to custom high system-wide DPI).
Not going to lie, I do not like it.
I prefer menus over panels.
Sorry to those who made this but I absolutely hate it. The previous UI wasn't the best but at least it was much more compact than this. Literally ads no meaningful feature while increasing taps needed for features and waste screen space.
Firefox mobile UX sucks.
Try select multiple bookmarks and then move them. Cant.
Save a bookmark and get a lingering notification that doesnt swipe away.
Download a file? Same.
This menu changes nothing except for some reason taking away the new tab menu option.
I dont mind a larger menu but what was chosen as huge and small makes little sense.
Agree 100%.
I still can't figure out how to add a shortcut to the new tab page lmao
Wish they just get the ui back to how it was like in the kitkat days
Chrome keeps my most used sites as suggestions. Firefox has massive tiles for most recent bookmarks. It is painfully inadequate at the simple things, it is only decent as a somewhat more private alternative to the big tech cancers.
Avid nightly user; I'm just starting to get used to it, and I think I it's better for most users, but I need to regular use the translate feature which doesn't automatically translate the languages that I need. So that's a few extra taps for me, and honestly it adds up.
It was mentioned her that their should be some kind of customization, and I would be happy to lose a little bit more of the background to have the translate button on the main menu
Customization would definetly help with such use cases, e.g. letting users replace lesser used buttons like Share or Home with Translation or Addons Menu.
I like the concept. It'd be nice to customise it a bit but I prefer it as more legible / bigger, plus in a decent location for my thumbs.
The old menu was unnecessarily cramped and to one side. This change has potential but isn't quite right yet.
It also does make much more sense if you move the tab bar to the bottom to complement it (doable.in settings menu).
I just wish they'd make it customizable to replace the home button with extension menu, new tab or remove it completely. That home button has been useless for me.
Absolutely, never really got how its existence was justified from the beginning but especially after tabbed browsing became a thing
Home button? Where? I don't see one.
Do you mean the navigation bar at the bottom? That can be changed in OS settings.
I like it. It's better en easier to use than the old one.
Note that I'm using it for multiple months at this point.
I like it when buttons can be reached entirely by my thumb without overstretching it. Feel like anything that isn't that is a design failure.
Assuming that's the menu that is accessed from the tab bar, my first thought is that it doesn't have everything the current one has. Where are "find in page" and "desktop site"?
That's right. These are missing because I opened it from the home screen. Here is a better screenshot:
I think I like the current one better from a usability perspective because it opens where I can access the whole thing with my thumb without having to stretch. Looks like that might not be the case here but we'll see I suppose
I don't hate it, but I would REALLY like to be able to move those buttons around. Refresh, share, and forward are hands-down my most used buttons. Having to chase them up feels tedious.
Similarly sign in (or, I'm guessing account once you do sign in) does not need that much real estate.
Finally I'd love to swap Passwords with a shortcut to my password manager of choice (in my case, Bitwarden)
I appreciate the more modern take, but I think it could use some refinement or customization options, similar to dragging things around your toolbar in FF desktop.
I have my navigation bar on the bottom, the new menu has the important navigation button on top regardless of this setting. So it means I have to press menu and the move my finger all the way up the screen anytime I want to go backward, forward, share, refresh, ...
The only button i use on a regular basis is the reload page. It moved and i need to re-learn the muscle memory but that's fine. Also i will most likely be using firefox on samsung's android XR headset and this panel will work a lot better for that.
Absolutely, I think the reload, back and forward button should move to the bottom
Don't mind it, just taking a little bit getting used to because it's such a big change. My muscle memory for certain things need to be tweaked. But it looks slick, and as far as I can tell the same functionality is there.
Looks more touch focused and friendly. Not necessarily bad on a mobile device. This might be rare occasion I don't mind a rsadical change done by Mozilla. Haven't actually tried it yet, just looking at the photo...
I like it, it looks more modern, I haven't given a proper though about the layout, but honestly seeing UI changes is good, I have been using FF as my main since a while now and I don't think it hasn't changed a bit, for example I'd like that it adopted material you UI (yes I like it), but what I would like the most is that it begins to support tab grouping just like the desktop browser... But hey, baby steps.
how did you get this?
i have my android set to automatic update and i see no upgrades advertised when i check.
It's currently on the Nightly version
Looks good, I always found the current menu pretty busy. Wish it didn't move the action buttons to the top and switch Refresh and Share though.
I don't mind.
It's fine
I'm not a fan. It's probably friendlier to an average user, but I feel like the information and actionable item density is much lower than before.
i do love it though i miss so much the feel of lollypop/jellybean era firefox android pre app refresh
I like it, that being said I still want a quicker way to access my extensions.
Where's AI Turbo button?
I hate it and changed it back almost immediately. The way I use Firefox, I always select "quit" to close it, which deletes all temporary files and cookies and this is just not doable with the new menu, which wastes precious screen space.
Why doesn't the big "quit" button work in the new case? Doesn't delete cookies, etc?
No, it does work, but I always have to scroll down to reach it, because the new menu does not show all the buttons at once, when opened. This is really annoying.
That sounds like a bug. It should display like in the picture and you shouldn't need to scroll.
I'm using Waterfox, maybe that's the problem... But when I open the menu, it's only half open and I have to scroll down every time. Will try with Firefox too and see if it happens there too.
Okay, I see what you mean... Firefox has a smaller menu, fitting neatly on one page, whereas Waterfox has a longer menu which needs scrolling. Sorry for the confusion and thanks for pointing this out.
All good
That does seem like a problem (bug?)
@mustbe3to20signs Interesting. I'll have to play with it a bit before I decide, but I'm not 100% in love with it right now.
A couple times a week my address bar detaches from the bottom and floats in the lower third of the screen until I close and reopen the app, but sure, prioritize needless changes to the UI.
It's a standard case of a department needing to justify its budget.
Does toggling the keyboard help?
A floating address bar could be more of a feature than a bug if done right 😂
Have you filed a bug report?
I hate it. They made it bulkier AND removed options. Wish I knew who to direct my ire at. Quit fixing what isn't broken.
There are other things that keep me away for the android version, no matter what menu they make. Things such as: • FFA doesn't have actual dials (like Opera for desktop and for android (OA)). Instead it pins whatever it wants on the so called "home screen" and often pins the same page 5-6 times. Bleh! • if you happen to enter a "hole" in the reception, FFA loses connection with the outside world and the only thing that helps to fix it, is to reboot the phone. This used to be a thing with OA but I reported it and they fixed it like 3-4 years ago. • doesn't have about:config. • doesn't have even basic customization options, like setting up custom wallpaper in the browser, like OA does. Generally, Opera devs seem to be more responsive to user suggestions. I suggested about:config for FFA at least a year ago, if not even longer than a year, people supported it but FFA still doesn't have about:config. So at this point I'm staying with the desktop version only (+ a fork of it) bc I can customize it in any way I want.
• The manually pinned literally sink somewhere behind the repeatedly pinned links from other sites, so manually is pointless. • If "force stop" and then start FFA were enough, I wouldn't mention phone reboot. • Never heard of those but I'll definitely try them. Thanks for the info. • If it does, I'never found it in the settings. Or, for whatever reason, it doesn't appear on Xiaomi phones.
Reading Hadriscus' comment below ours from 2 weeks ago, looks like the reason I abandoned the desktop FF (and went for a fork) has been moved to FFA - enorcing their view on what's best for the user without giving the user the option to revert what they have done. Do I have to say this behavior which famous corp. reminds me of or will Mozilla think of it themselves?
doesnt have enough materialu curves, and the dark theme is too dark. i need to feel like im in my mother's womb again. /s
There's a firefox android...?
It's Firefox for Android, sorry for the confusion
For the sake of historical accuracy: there once was a FirefoxOS for mobile devices. It wasn't related to Android.
I really wanna know why developers can’t focus on animations and UI consistency… I tried Firefox on iOS, and the lack of linear touch animations made me immediately stop using it.