Firefox 129.0: Reader View enhancements, HTTPS and DNS improvements, and security fixes

Mozilla has released Firefox 129.0 Stable as well as Firefox 128.1 ESR and Firefox 115.14 ESR. Firefox 129 makes several important changes to the browser. Notable are the switch to HTTPS first for non-local addresses, use of system DNS settings on some operating systems, and Reader View enhancements.

All development versions of Firefox were updated as well. The new versions are Firefox 130 Beta and Firefox 131 Nightly.

Executive Summary

Firefox 129 fixes security issues, bugs, and adds new features.
Firefox 115 ESR will receive one additional releases until it is retired on October 1, 2024,

Firefox 129.0 download and update

Firefox downloads and installs updates automatically. It may take a while before the browser downloads the update. If you want to speed things up, you may select Menu > Help > About Firefox to run a manual check for updates.

Firefox will check for updates to install any new version that it finds.

You can also download the latest version of Firefox by following these links:

Firefox 129.0 changes

Reader View improvements

Reader View has a few enhancements in Firefox 129

Reader View offers enhanced readability for articles in Firefox. It removes distractions and includes some customization options. You can launch it with the shortcut F9 on supported articles, or by activating the Reader Mode icon that Firefox displays in the address bar when it encounters a suitable webpage.

Mozilla improved Reader View in Firefox 129 in several ways:

The text and layout menu offers more options, including character spacing, word spacing, and text alignment.
The new theme menu has additional contrast and gray options.
Also new is the option to select custom colors for text, the background, and links.

Tab Previews

When you hover the mouse over a background tab in Firefox, a visual preview of the webpage is displayed now. The preview includes the title, domain, and a snapshot of the page.

This makes it easier to locate a specific tab, especially if page titles are identical or only icons are displayed.

Note: The feature is rolling out gradually. You can enable it right away in the following way:

Load about:config in the Firefox address bar.
Search for browser.tabs.hoverPreview.enabled.
Toggle the preference so that its value is True.

Previews should now be enabled. If you do not want the feature, toggle the value to False to disable it.

Other changes and fixes

Firefox tries the HTTPS protocol first now when users type a domain name in the address bar. This is true only for non-local sites. The browser falls back to HTTP is HTTPS is not supported or available.
HTTPS DNS records can be resolved using the DNS resolver of the operating system on Windows 11, Linux, and Android 10+ devices.
macOS VoiceOver support for multiple languages in the same document.
Address autofill is now available for Firefox users in Germany and France.

Developer changes

This is a collection of changes. For all of them, check the Developer link at the bottom of the article.

The Network Blocking feature in the Network panel now blocks HTTP requests in addition to blocking responses.
The @starting-style CSS at-rule is supported
The transition-behavior CSS property is supported.
Float16Array typed arrays are now supported.
The deprecated textInput event is now supported.
The default .toJSON() methods GeolocationCoordinates.toJSON() and GeolocationPosition.toJSON() are now supported.
MediaCapabilities.decodingInfo() can now get decoding information for a particular encrypted media configuration as well unencrypted media.
The Ed25519 digital signature algorithm is supported by the Web Crypto API.

Enterprise changes

The DisableFirefoxStudies policy was updated to “properly disable Nimbus, Firefox’s cross-platform experimentation tool”.

Security updates / fixes

Mozilla fixed 14 unique security issues in Firefox. The aggregate severity rating is high. Mozilla makes no mentions of exploits in the wild.

Outlook

Firefox 130, Firefox 128.2 ESR, and Firefox 115.15 ESR will be released on September 9th, 2024.

Recent Firefox news and tips

Additional information / resources

Closing Words

Reader View is a useful feature that offers some interesting options, such as the ability to change the width of content. The new options improve the mode further. I just wish there was an option to enable it permanently on certain sites.

Firefox 115 ESR will reach end of support soon. There will be just one more release for the old ESR version. It is unclear how Mozilla plans to keep it alive for Windows 7 and 8.1 (only).

Have you tried the new Firefox version already? What is your take on the improvements?

Summary