4 ms·

I am using FF on Android (both phone and tablet) with sync and great addons like adblock/self destructing cookies/lastpass and am mostly a happy camper. Mozilla

I am using FF on Android (both phone and tablet) with sync and great addons like adblock/self destructing cookies/lastpass and am mostly a happy camper. Mozilla has resolved most of the performance issues barring one - compared to Chrome or stock browser the time it takes for FF to go from link tapped to page loading started is a bit annoyingly high. Many times after tapping a link it just sits there doing nothing or showing the spinner in the URL bar for quite some time. Not sure if it's the addons but I recall having similar issue on a fresh install. If anyone from Mozilla reading this has any pointers, please let me know. Edit: Also the one other thing that frequently bugs me is FF not honoring the Android intent system. YouTube and Play Store links when opened in FF give me no option of opening them in their respective apps - it goes straight to the URL. I guess I'll file a bug for this issue.

codereflection 13y ago
Me too, the time it takes to initially load a link is really long compared to Chrome, even on a quad core mobile device. I hope they resolve this soon.
- nikbackm 13y ago
  Hmm, might that be due to Chrome pre-fetching the page?
  - codereflection 13y ago
    I don't think so. It happens all the time. Even when I just have about:blank open, and go to something like ddg.gg or google.com, it's like the browser hangs for a couple of seconds, then it loads the page really quick. It's that initial hang that is really aggravating.
fpgeek 13y ago
Firefox is both better and worse than other browsers in dealing with intents. On the worse side, unlike some other browsers Firefox doesn't raise intents for redirected URLs, missing some opportunities to match appropriate apps. I believe the underlying issue is that too many redirect situations are ambiguous (especially if you might not be the default browser). I mostly deal with this with an external wrapper (Browser Auto Selector, Unshorten or the like), but it's still a weakness. On the other side, the Firefox intnet feature that I love is that when you long-press/right-click/etc on a URL that matches some non-browser apps, you get the option of opening it in those apps (for YouTube, the Play Store, Twitter, etc.). I haven't seen any other browser with that option (though, to be fair, I spend most of my time in Firefox). It would be extra-wonderful if there were a reliable way to hit the YouTube link from an embedded video, but even without that, it's very handy.
- blinkingled 13y ago
  > you get the option of opening it in those apps (for YouTube, the Play Store, Twitter, etc.) Great find, I hadn't noticed that one before! It does make things better.
- shrikant 13y ago
  You don't even need to long press to find this out -- if the URL of the site you're on 'supports' being opened in an app, a little grey android icon appears in the address bar. You can tap this icon to open the URL in the related app.
  - fpgeek 13y ago
    Oh, that's another cool feature! Thanks for mentioning it. I can quibble that I wish it were a bit more obvious and that the Android icon appeared before the page started loading (next to the X), but it is still going to make many things more convenient for me.
AlexanderDhoore 13y ago
The video isn't online yet, but at FOSDEM this weekend there was a talk about "Firefox on Android". The guy said that it's actually adblock that's causing the long delays.
- blinkingled 13y ago
  Thanks, I will experiment with disabling adblock and see if gets better.
- handsomeransoms 13y ago
  As a general rule: if you think Firefox is slow/laggy, try running it with addons disabled. One or more addons are often the culprit. For page load lag, addons like ABP are often especially bad because they're running the URI of each request against a bunch of regex filters to determine if the load should be allowed to begin.
zurn 13y ago
As long as Android Chrome bans privacy extensions there aren't really any sensible alternatives to Firefox. Re. Play links and such, those have been showing up for me in the context menu (long press) at least with Firefox Beta.

codereflection 13y ago

Me too, the time it takes to initially load a link is really long compared to Chrome, even on a quad core mobile device. I hope they resolve this soon.

nikbackm 13y ago
Hmm, might that be due to Chrome pre-fetching the page?
- codereflection 13y ago
  I don't think so. It happens all the time. Even when I just have about:blank open, and go to something like ddg.gg or google.com, it's like the browser hangs for a couple of seconds, then it loads the page really quick. It's that initial hang that is really aggravating.

fpgeek 13y ago

Firefox is both better and worse than other browsers in dealing with intents. On the worse side, unlike some other browsers Firefox doesn't raise intents for redirected URLs, missing some opportunities to match appropriate apps. I believe the underlying issue is that too many redirect situations are ambiguous (especially if you might not be the default browser). I mostly deal with this with an external wrapper (Browser Auto Selector, Unshorten or the like), but it's still a weakness. On the other side, the Firefox intnet feature that I love is that when you long-press/right-click/etc on a URL that matches some non-browser apps, you get the option of opening it in those apps (for YouTube, the Play Store, Twitter, etc.). I haven't seen any other browser with that option (though, to be fair, I spend most of my time in Firefox). It would be extra-wonderful if there were a reliable way to hit the YouTube link from an embedded video, but even without that, it's very handy.

blinkingled 13y ago
> you get the option of opening it in those apps (for YouTube, the Play Store, Twitter, etc.) Great find, I hadn't noticed that one before! It does make things better.
shrikant 13y ago
You don't even need to long press to find this out -- if the URL of the site you're on 'supports' being opened in an app, a little grey android icon appears in the address bar. You can tap this icon to open the URL in the related app.
- fpgeek 13y ago
  Oh, that's another cool feature! Thanks for mentioning it. I can quibble that I wish it were a bit more obvious and that the Android icon appeared before the page started loading (next to the X), but it is still going to make many things more convenient for me.

AlexanderDhoore 13y ago

The video isn't online yet, but at FOSDEM this weekend there was a talk about "Firefox on Android". The guy said that it's actually adblock that's causing the long delays.

blinkingled 13y ago
Thanks, I will experiment with disabling adblock and see if gets better.
handsomeransoms 13y ago
As a general rule: if you think Firefox is slow/laggy, try running it with addons disabled. One or more addons are often the culprit. For page load lag, addons like ABP are often especially bad because they're running the URI of each request against a bunch of regex filters to determine if the load should be allowed to begin.

zurn 13y ago

As long as Android Chrome bans privacy extensions there aren't really any sensible alternatives to Firefox. Re. Play links and such, those have been showing up for me in the context menu (long press) at least with Firefox Beta.