Firefox weak again. This time, it’s fighting Chrome and other Chromium-based systems web browsers Instead of Internet Explorer. Firefox ended 2025 with a global market share of just 3.5% Cloudflareso he fights from behind a lot. But Mozilla’s new head of Firefox, Ajit Varma, has an old plan to take you over: “Build better features, build a better browser, and people will use it.”
Varma is a former director of product management at Google who took over as head of Firefox at the end of 2025. He has a long history with Firefox: When Mozilla released Firefox in 2004, he was a web developer at eBay. He remembers calling Mozilla’s public meetings excited about the future of the Internet. Varma is still passionate about the web, and he thinks Mozilla is in a unique position to deliver the best browser experience for years to come.
Firefox Gets New Features Fast
“The last year has been really good for Firefox,” Varma told me. “We went back to basics and said, ‘What are all the features that people really want in a browser?’ He pointed to the latest features. AI controlFirefox VPN, split view and vertical tabs as an example. “We started delivering features faster.”
According to Varman, Mozilla’s efforts in recent months are paying off, with power users and the technical community increasingly using Firefox. It sounds like a start, but it hasn’t changed the overall downward trend I’ve seen in Cloudflare’s data.
Firefox’s performance has also improved in recent years, and Varma says it’s now very fast. “In 2023, we completely redesigned Firefox to make it faster,” he said. I can confirm anecdotally that Firefox seems faster than ever, although the latest version still lags behind Chrome in benchmarks like Speedometer (below).
Varma doesn’t think the differences in synthetic browser benchmarks are particularly important. He says he doesn’t notice any difference in real-world performance: “I kind of equate it to a car: If a car can go 200 miles per hour or a car can go 220 miles per hour, does it really matter?”
Mozilla Wants People to Think More About Browser Privacy
Mozilla also focuses on features that other major browsers don’t offer, like the aforementioned VPN, Varma says. Chrome and Edge do not include VPNs, while Brave’s VPN is a paid feature. Firefox’s new VPN provides 50 GB free data every month. (Despite its name, this feature only works for Firefox browser traffic, which makes it more proxy. You need it to protect network traffic from other apps on your device private VPN service.)
Free VPNs are popular, but most of them don’t respect your privacy. “A lot of VPN products that are free are very sketchy,” he says. “As they take your data, they sell your data. We don’t sell data.” Firefox’s VPN isn’t the only VPN that respects your privacy; our recommended free VPNs is also a good choice.
Firefox isn’t the only browser with a free VPN either: Opera and Vivaldi both include it (Vivaldi ProtonVPN).
Firefox has a new mascot named Kit (Credit: Mozilla)
Varma thinks Mozilla needs to do a better job about privacy in general. “We do a lot of work on the privacy side,” he says. “We make sure we can’t see your browsing history (in Firefox Sync) and it’s all end-to-end encrypted.” He says that people are interested private messagingbut many did not give much thought to themselves browser data. He wants Mozilla to talk more about privacy going forward.
Personalization goes hand in hand with privacy. Varma talks about making it easy for people to share customized versions of Firefox as one-click downloads. These custom Firefox installations can include anything from custom wallpapers to tweaked privacy settings.
Independent Browser is still important
with Chrome no longer supports Manifest V2 extensionsFirefox has the strongest extension ecosystem. For example, uBlock is the best browser for the full version of Origin ad blockerfull version no longer works in Chrome. “We’re the only ones that support these extensions, which are kind of blocked by other browsers over time.”
This is because Firefox uses its own engine, Gecko. Apple also has its own WebKit engine for Safari. Most other browsers use Chromium, which is the basis for Google Chrome. It’s a technical argument, but Varma thinks you should pay attention.
“What I would ask people is: Why do they like the Internet and what makes the Internet special?” Varma says. “The two main engines, WebKit and Chromium, are run by companies that would be better off using app stores.” He notes that such stores have rules and charge a fee. But anyone can build for the web. “There are so many companies, from Google to Facebook ChatGPT“Because they didn’t have a doorman blocking their entry,” he says.
Varma says that Firefox is the browser that best fits this vision. It’s from an independent company, it’s fully open source, and it ensures that no big company can change the rules of the internet at will. By the way, Mozilla still receives the majority of its revenue from Google, which leaves the company in a difficult position. Google is reportedly paying Mozilla more than $400 million a year to be the default search engine in Firefox, although the exact figure has not been disclosed. If Google were forced to sell Chrome, Firefox would be in serious trouble antitrust case.
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Firefox will not force AI on you
Mozilla is clearly sensitive to the AI controversy. “We’re not going to force this on anyone,” Varma said. Mozilla’s PR team told me they want to be both the best browser for people who hate AI and the safest browser for people who love AI.
“We start small,” Varma tells me agent scanning experiences offered by browsers such as The OpenAI Atlas and Comet of Confusion they are not in the spotlight. “We’re really trying to create things of value.”
Firefox will put new AI features into a dedicated Smart Window (Credit: Mozilla)
He also argues that the focus on AI at other tech companies is to the detriment of their browsers. There is Google Twins Chrome and Microsoft have it Copilot in Edge, for example, but Mozilla isn’t trying to be an AI company. “If you ask that company, ‘What is your priority? Do you want to succeed in the browser or do you want to succeed in AI?’, they would probably say they want to succeed in AI.”
Why Varma Thinks You Should Change
Varma’s proposition for Firefox is that it’s responsive to the websites you use, fast and an all-around great browser. But in a world where browsers are often seen as commodities, his bigger argument is that you trust Mozilla more than its competitors.
“We build features that maximize user experience, not profit. We don’t have a structure that forces us to maximize shareholder value.”
“Our goal is to be the most trusted software company,” Varma said. “We build features that maximize user experience, not profit. We don’t have a structure that forces us to maximize shareholder value.”
He thinks Firefox will be more differentiated in the future. “Our motivation is to create the best browser,” he said. “And we don’t have any competing goals other than that singular focus.”
About our specialist
Chris Hoffman
Senior Writer, Software
Experience
I’ve been writing about technology for over 15 years, and I’ve been using it twice as seriously. As a member of PCMag’s software team, I focus on Windows coverage, but also write about other major desktop operating systems and system software. (I’ve used Windows 3.1 since its release and followed each subsequent release closely).
Before joining PCMag, I wrote for How-To Geek starting in 2011, and my articles have garnered over a billion page views. For four and a half years, I led the publication as the editor-in-chief. I’ve also contributed to Computerworld, Fast Company, PCWorld, Reader’s Digest, The New York Times, and many other publications on everything from artificial intelligence to computer hardware to Windows. I co-founded and manage my direct-to-reader Windows-focused newsletters, Windows Intelligence and Windows ReadMe, in partnership with Thurrott.com.
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