Summary
-
Firefox 151 finally lets you choose which country’s VPN server to connect to.
-
Firefox’s built-in VPN used to automatically select the nearest server without a country selector.
-
The rollout is limited: only certain countries have it, and some users still don’t have VPN access.
I don’t think I’m being too controversial when I say that a good VPN will let you choose which country’s servers you want to connect to. Of course, connecting to a node in your home country is good for privacy and guarantees the best possible speed, but sometimes you want a website to believe you’re visiting from somewhere else, and that’s when you need a server selector.
Unfortunately, as cool as it is to add a free, built-in VPN to the Firefox browser, it was a shame to see that it doesn’t let you choose which server you want to connect to. Instead, Firefox will simply record your location, find the server closest to you, and connect you to that server. However, Firefox 151 will finally let you choose a server, although some people may not have VPN enabled in their browser.
Firefox 151 will allow you to choose the location of the VPN
Better late than never
As seen OMG UbuntuFirefox’s built-in VPN is getting a much-needed update soon. We saw VPN first appear in Firefox 149 when it offered support for UK, US, France and Germany. However, there was no server selection feature; Firefox simply chose the one closest to the user. Canada was added to the mix with Firefox 150, but still no option to select another country.
Now with Firefox 151, Mozilla lets people choose which country’s server to connect to. Your options are currently limited to countries that have access to the VPN feature, but it’s still very useful for bypassing geoblocks. However, OMG Ubuntu notes that some people using Firefox 150 in eligible countries don’t even have access to the VPN feature yet, so it may be a while before the tool is readily available after Firefox 151 is released.
