Firefox promises Quantup update will make it faster than Chrome

Over the years, Firefox has lost a lot of marketshare to Google's Chrome browser. While Firefox is definitely not a bad browser, many enthusiasts perceive it as a slower browser, and it also has an unfortunate past of being a memory hog.

Mozilla is starting a new offensive and teases Firefox Quantum, a big browser overhaul that will be published on November 14, 2017. The Firefox Quantum browser promises double the speed versus the Firefox 52 release. The browser maker claims Firefox Quantum will be faster on average than Chrome, while also using 30 percent less RAM!

Firefox has historically run mostly on just one CPU core, but Firefox Quantum takes advantage of multiple CPU cores in today’s desktop and mobile devices much more effectively. This improved utilization of your computer’s hardware makes Firefox Quantum dramatically faster. One example: we’ve developed a breakthrough approach to laying out pages: a super fast CSS engine written in Rust, a systems programming language that Mozilla pioneered. Firefox’s new CSS engine runs quickly, in parallel across multiple CPU cores, instead of running in one slower sequence on a single core. No other browser can do this.

We’ve also improved Firefox so that the tab you’re actively using downloads and runs before other tabs you have open in the background. This prioritization of your active tab, along with Firefox’s “just right” multi-process architecture, results in Firefox Quantum often being faster than Chrome, while consuming roughly 30% less RAM.

At the same time, Mozilla will also be rolling out the new Photon design. Mozilla pitches Photon as a new, minimalist design with square tabs and smooth animations. Among other things, Photon is optimized for high-DPI displays and puts your needs first.

The full details about all the changes can be read at the Mozilla blog. You can try a beta version today or wait until November 14 for the final release for the desktop, Android, and iOS.