Firefox 66.0 and 66.0.1

Estimated reading time: 2 minutes.

The latest major release of Firefox is version 66, which was announced on March 19th. The new version includes some welcome improvements and twenty-one security fixes.

What’s new in Firefox 66?

  • Audio is now prevented from playing by default. You can override this behaviour with a global setting, or add specific web sites to an exclusion list.
  • When you have a lot of tabs open, Firefox now shows a down-arrow button at the end of the tab bar. Clicking this button shows a list of all open tabs, and provides a special search function, allowing you to search your open tabs.
  • Scroll Anchoring tries to keep your content in place even as advertising and other images try to push what you’re reading off the page.
  • Extensions get a slight speed boost.
  • It’s now a bit easier to configure keyboard shortcuts for extensions.
  • HTTPS certificate error pages are easier to understand.
  • Additional performance and stability improvements, especially during page loading.
  • AV1 video support was added to the 32-bit version of Firefox.

Firefox 66.0.1 addresses two security issues in earlier versions, and was released on March 22nd.

You can check which version you’re running by clicking Firefox’s ‘hamburger’ menu, and navigating to Help > About Firefox. If you’re not yet up to date, you should see an Update button that allows you to install the latest version.

About jrivett

Jeff Rivett has worked with and written about computers since the early 1980s. His first computer was an Apple II+, built by his father and heavily customized. Jeff's writing appeared in Computist Magazine in the 1980s, and he created and sold a game utility (Ultimaker 2, reviewed in the December 1983 Washington Apple Pi Journal) to international markets during the same period. Proceeds from writing, software sales, and contract programming gigs paid his way through university, earning him a Bachelor of Science (Computer Science) degree at UWO. Jeff went on to work as a programmer, sysadmin, and manager in various industries. There's more on the About page, and on the Jeff Rivett Consulting site.

Leave a Reply