Having teased us with the prospect of a big announcement this week, Mozilla’s big reveal is an upgrade to Firefox for Android on the eve of Google’s I/O developer conference.
With the new upgrade, Mozilla is boasting a dramatic performance improvement for faster start-up and page load times and better touch responsiveness when panning or zooming.
According to the Eideticker benchmark developed by Mozilla, Firefox for Android is now three times faster than its previous version and close to twice as fast as Opera.
It also claims to be faster than Chrome for Android, though this claim may not last long as Google is expected to unveil all sorts of goodies at its developer conference tomorrow, and an upgraded Chrome for mobile could be one of them.
The new-look browser features a completely redesigned user interface and start page with top sites and tabs from your last use. There’s also the new ‘Awesome Screen’, which syncs your browsing history, bookmarks, passwords and form data to your phone.
Tabbed browsing and add-ons have been optimised and Adobe Flash support and HTML 5 capabilities have been added. Other features include font size inflation for better readability and tap-to-play for plug-ins.
The new version also lays claim to enhanced security, offering a high level of privacy and security features in mobile browsing, such as Do Not Track, Master Password, HTTP Strict Transport Security, and secure browsing for Google searches.
The new Firefox for Android is available now on Google Play.
