Chromium has better features, but with google announcing its plan to ‘drm the internet’ I 'm not sure if it’d be a good idea.
What better features? Firefox has pretty much everything nowadays, and is as fast as Chrome.
From the comments I’m noticing a trend
- Google Chromecast issues
- Not allowed to do background effects in Google meet
and from personal experience:
- issues using the store to update add-ons on Google docs
- can’t authenticate desktop Google drive
I use a lot of Google products, but avoid Chrome because of nonsense like this. Firefox works fine for everything else EXCEPT certain Google products. Feels intentional
100% intentional. If you spoof your browser signature most work just fine
Google Meet background effects actually work in Firefox if you spoof Firefox user agent to Chrome, I kid you not.
It should work soon without it. Google is just being google and takes its time to fix the problem they created in the first place.
This is exactly why companies spend money on marketing, people remember these ideas and internalize them as their justification long after it stops being true. And Chrome being fast hasn’t been true for a long time.
It still wins most benchmarks, so it’s technically true. Although not really enough to matter on desktop where it’s millisecond differences
It doesn’t have translations. I use it anyway, but it’s a minor inconvenience as I live in a foreign country.
Translations might be coming soon
Done locally on the device, so no risk of personal info going to some company
Chromium browsers have only 1 feature I need: access to the Chromecast API. I have 3, Firefox can’t connect to them and the last 2-3 times I tried the listed 3rd party methods (fx bridge, etc), I could never get it to work.
Were it not for that, I’d be back on Firefox.
well? what do you have? I would love to flush my chromecasts but they’re so useful.
Have you tried setting browser.casting.enabled = true in Firefox’s about:config settings?
Trust me, I’ve tried everything there is. For hours, literally. Nothing worked.
(Casting from Firefox (beta) on Android.)
Edge’s vertical tabs and grouping. Every solution on Firefox feels half-baked.
On Android tablets, most non-Firefox browsers support a tab bar, and tablet optimised UI. Firefox is just a giant stretched phone layout. I like to use the same browser on all platforms so I can sync tabs, so Firefox being crap on my tablet rules it out for my other devices too.
I uae Fennec, which is a better (but just okay) android browser from f-droid based on firefox. It has firefox sync. Just fyi.
I’ll give you one reason where Firefox blows chrome out of the water: multi account containers:
Firefox Multi-Account Containers lets you keep parts of your online life separated into color-coded tabs. Cookies are separated by container, allowing you to use the web with multiple accounts
That way you can seamlessly have multiple accounts for a specific site open side by side (for example, your work and your personal mail with the same mail provider). Especially amazing if you’re an IT contractor who works for multiple clients.
Yeah it is also good for a bit more privacy on the internet. I have separate containers for Amazon websites, Google, banking etc. Even more powerful tool if you pair it up with a VPN - can have different VPN locations on each container so break up attempts at tracking and profiling you across the web.
This is one feature I literally can’t do my job without. Used to have 3 separate browsers installed + opened at the same time for all my various Azure accounts till FF saved the day!
This is super useful for any sort of development work - you basically get unlimited, separate private windows that you can log into stuff separately.
I use it for multi account switching on Reddit, I still do a lot of scam bot fighting over there and being able to easily switch between several users is really helpful.
Firefox
I’ve been using Firefox at home for as long as I can remember. I’ve not found anything I can’t do with it yet.
If something doesn’t work you can always try it in edge of something either way.
Firefox doesn’t support background effects in Google Meet so i can’t blur my background during my daily work meetings. That’s the only reason i still have to use Chromium browsers
Did you try agent spoofing (which probably won’t work in the future because of this). This sounds like things Microsoft (and now Google) does to make their product look better.
Lots of reasons. You may not want clients or outside vendors to be looking into your home, which is IMO a sort of intimate thing. I have a client who has a custom, branded background so things look more professional and cohesive - very important in the financial field (or so I’m told). Or maybe your WFH setup is in the kitchen because that’s the only space you had to put it and you don’t want your kids, pets, and spouse ducking into and out of every meeting you have.
I’m guessing you don’t work in corporate environment or no longer work from home.
There are times when video is expected to be on, but you don’t want to show your room to everyone.
Having said that I can’t think of firefox being able to stream video yet not being able to do this, so likely it is Google’s way to make its competitor look subpar. Probably can be fixed by spoofing user agent. Ironically the most recent change in Chrome will make this very difficult in the future.
Firefox! This is the way!
