The company Mozilla, constantly improving the Firefox browser, spoke about the latest changes in its software. In just one month, users made 17 billion clicks in its browsers and this prompted a revision of the browser interface, taking into account basic preferences.
According to Mozilla, the company’s new mobile and desktop versions of the browser take into account all user habits. For example, the developers found that 43% of clicks go to the tab bar, 33% to the navigation (address) bar, and about 5% to the bookmarks bar. When redesigning the browser, users’ favorite menus were also taken into account. It was also noted that preferences differed from region to region.
After analyzing the behavioral patterns, the developers simplified the browser as much as possible.
First of all, the navigation was simplified. The navigation bar now includes forward, back, and refresh buttons. The address bar contains an information protection icon, a lock, and the actual space for entering a URL or search query. Commonly used settings include Reading Mode, Zoom Level, and Bookmark buttons.
Optimized streamlined menus are now available. It turned out that the most popular was the “hamburger” menu – the three bars in the upper right corner and the menu called by the right mouse button. In addition, in the menus themselves, the titles were lined up according to their statistical priority for users, and the icons became easier for intuitive understanding, and some were simply removed.
There is a new design of tabs. According to statistics, more than 50% of people keep 4 or more tabs open at the same time. The new design allows you to move them freely and neatly, and autoplay in inactive tabs is paused. The tabs are now “unpinned” from the browser so that they can be dragged into a new window if necessary and grouped as you see fit.
Optimized notifications. Constant pop-up notifications are one of the main factors that usually annoy users and if it is necessary to receive timely information about some events, it should not be intrusive. Therefore, the notification panels have been combined and simplified, and you can access them literally with a couple of clicks.
We paid special attention to Apple devices. An improved interface has been developed for iPhone and iPad users. The number of steps to start searching in a new tab has decreased – the keyboard pops up in it automatically, providing a quick search. Also, users can clearly see the logo of the search engine used. Improved tab navigation, updated design of elements and names in the menu in accordance with similar characteristics in the versions of Firefox for Android and desktop computers.
Finally, the private browsing mode has been taken to the next level. Back in February, as part of the Enhanced Tracking Protection (ETP), the Total Cookie Protection feature was introduced to prevent websites from collecting cookies. This feature has now been added to normal private browsing as well.
The company plans to release new browsers in the future. The latest versions of Firefox for smartphones and desktops can be downloaded from the Mozilla website.