New (worse) android UI change

[keedr1n]

I left a review on the google play store and noticed that all the "official" responses from mozilla encouraged us to come to the discussions page to share our thoughts on the new update, so here I am. 

This update is bad, full stop. it increases the size of the tabs in grid view so that I can see less of them on my screen at once compared to the previous UI version (degraded functionality), I can swap to the grid view so that I can see more tabs on the screen at once again, but Now the thumbnail for what the site looks like is much smaller so its in no way a replacement for the old grid view. if there is some more important back-end change that this came packaged with, can we just have an option to have smaller windows again in the grid view? I dislike losing out on screen real estate for changes that have no tangible benefit to the user, and just letting me have the smaller windows back would fix most of my issues here. oh and let me swipe down to close tab view again, it doesnt need to be full screen.

The meatball menu is the more egregious change of the two. for years smartphones have been getting bigger and harder to fit in the hand, so I originally thought it was genius the way that firefox had the right-aligned meatball menu that was clearly meant to be easily navigated with one hand. why change it like this? it now has a little animation associated with it which means the menu takes longer to load, and now the menu has gone from taking up like 20% of my screen while still having every option i need easily accessible, to now taking up 85% of my screen and i have to go back to awkwardly tilting my phone in my hands so that i can access options that previously were easily in reach of my thumb. theres no way around it, this one just needs a toggle to go back to the smaller menu (a toggle that previously existed and could easily be re-enabled in the secret settings maybe?)

Please I really liked using firefox on my phone so much, but if this UI change is left the way it is now I really have no choice but to uninstall and find a new browser to use. please please please see reason here firefox devs, you had something great before, just give it back to the people who vastly preferred it.

[iunno]

Yep. New UI is absolute trash. Who's moronic idea was it to "fix" what was already perfect? Who the hell would  want this Fisher-Price style UI?

[WaggleDance]

Totally agree.  The changes are style-over-function, neophilic nonsense, that ignore the actual purpose of the browser which is to ENABLE users to navigate the web.

[AuspiciousCrane]

Agreed. The new UI changes were horrible. Apart from the aforementioned complaits above, it is now much harder to switch to incognito mode when operating one-handed as well. Before, it was somewhat doable, as the incognito button was on the top right. But now that it has moved to the left (and been changed to a tab)...

Please return the UI changes back to normal. That, or at least leave the option to turn it back. 

[KittenSparkles]

Yes! This change is terrible and unnecessary. It was fine the way it was, let us choose to go back on this! Before today I could disable studies and revert back, but now even that approach is gone. Just let me change it back!

[ilyabelow]

Totally agree. Please, Mozilla, I beg you, just add an option to revert. New design is so hideous I'm thinking of switching. 

The redesign was first rolled out in February, then it was rolled back, now it is rolled out again and old methods of reverting does not work...

[BunchInTheCase]

Yeah, the new UI is absolutely awful. It's so terrible to use, and it looks even worse.

[mamta25]

I feel the same. The changes focus on appearance, not on helping users actually use the browser efficiently.

[Crusader_Nejaa]

It's genuinely awful. I don't know who looks at a simple and functional menu and tab tray and thinks "this works but could be updated". Why? It worked perfectly before, no one complained about it and moreover no thought twice about it. Everything was in its place. Now the tab viewer feels like they're using a beta version of a secondary app to show us what tabs we have open that can't be swiped away like the previous one. The three dot menu requires extra click to get to the options that were just front row in the previous one and other options are hidden even further in. Not to mention the lack of simplicity leading to the reduction in usability for some people, both with a disability and without. The whole thing reaks of lack of testing and feedback 

[Mr_Jet]

I think its not the firefox UI problem I mean if your phone can make a open in pop-up view the UI mighty shrink a little because for me the firefox browser mobile just work as it should be, enough display, simple UI the tab and buttons are not to small not to big.. but due that my phone is small that's must be the reason why the UI work to my phone... so I think if you want to make the UI to be one-hand enable a setup or settings that make the main screen one hand... I mean its just my suggestion tho so please let's relax and let's not betrayed Firefox

[Crusader_Nejaa]

The new UI is bad. Full stop. I'm hoping against hope that they revert this unnecessary, un needed, un asked for, and un looked for change to how the app looks and functions. But until then I've changed my default browsers and won't be going back until and unless they fix what they messed up.

[BlueSnivyian]

As I cannot see my other reply anymore, I am to now believe the mods are deleting any messages they see fit to try and steer the narrative on top of everything else that has transpired.

Once again, why should we not betrayed Firefox when they are currently betraying their own users?

[jehad_husein]

I think that browsers are a matter of personal preference, so it's not possible to have one browser that everyone likes. Personally, I find the new UI quite nice, and I don't see any problems with it.

[ginger_vanilla]

Seconding!! Please at least give us an option to make the tabs smaller and fit more on screen. I don't actually personally mind the new menu that much, but the giant images of tabs are really unhelpful and make the app harder to use. 

[WaggleDance]

Hopefully, this style-over-function change to Firefox won't become an ego-over-objections issue.  Too often, users' feedback plays second fiddle to the 'sunk costs'  in a particular direction.

There are so many reasons why this is a very poorly considered set of changes.  Please  remember that many people don't turn up here in the face of en**bleep**ification;  they just  quietly suffer then get attracted elsewhere.  Being loyal to FOSS software involves reporting issues and even complaining about it, not just blindly flag waving for your historic choice of software.   This is FOSS development, not 'betrayal'!

[SSJMarx]

Seconding this.  It's absolutely ridiculous - nobody was asking FF to update the mobile UI, in fact the old UI was widely praised for it's simplicity and efficiency.  It's also unacceptable that the change can no longer be reverted, I have every single "nimbus experiment" and "secret debug" feature turned off and I am still stuck with this disaster.

[Cathexis]

The new ui is horrible, the information density is much lower and you've removed useful functionality like the ability to share the open tab list. Please don't make me have to abandon the only alternative to google chrome.

[AmericanLoco]

Please fix the tab and menu for top address-bar users. See below for examples of how to fix it:

[Crusader_Nejaa]

The best way for them to fix it is to just revert the change and leave the other design as an option to those who want it.

[0377642936]

yyunh972@gmail.com

[pwhx]

For real, the new menu is awful. It's too bulky. It's completely unsuitable for one-handed use. It introduces pointless submenus to hide options that weren't hidden before. Please let us go back.

[jlpxsc]

Completely agree. I can no longer use my phone one-handed. Dur to disability I can't use my other hand... Now I have to place on a table to use this. Garbage. If I wanted it to look like iOS I would get an iPhone. Endless scrolling and "more" menu taps to get to things that used to be a single tap away. 

Apparently they just don't read or care about feedback.

What browsers are everybody switching to? I need one for Android that runs ublock and is not Chrome or Edge. 

[Crusader_Nejaa]

Someone suggested Iceraven which is a fork of Firefox that still has everything we want intact. I haven't had a chance to test it myself yet. I've been using Brave but it doesn't have the list view that I love so much, which I imagine might be a deal breaker for you. However it does have a built in as blocker that I haven't had any issues with as of yet. It is chromium based though. 

Duckduckgo's browser UI has the list view but is limited to only having Duckduckgo as a search engine

[jehad_husein]

I think that browsers are a matter of personal preference, so it's not possible to have one browser that everyone likes. Personally, I find the new UI quite nice and I don't see any problems with it.

[BlueSnivyian]

Great for you, however as seen by the current state of this feedback board, not everyone agrees.

On top of the very valid criticism people have brought up, there's been multiple disabled people saying that this update has made the browser practically unusable compared to before. Regardless of whether you "like it" or not it's clear that there needs to be a PERMANENT and EASILY ACCESSIBLE toggle that implements the old UI.

Also consider the fact that, the old UI WAS still completely usable (via hidden menu options that shouldn't be hidden) before this update, and nobody complained because they could just…switch back. It wasn't until the update that forced it on EVERYONE that it caused a massive wave of backlash.

[WaggleDance]

@jehad_husein  said "it's not possible to have one browser that everyone likes ... I don't see any problems with it."

That's demonstrating that you haven't read the comments of the multiple issues found by others above - or simply don't care.  Either way, that's not contributing to a conversation so why add an "I'm fine; stop complaining" comment to an issue?  I'd guess you were also fine before the problematic changes, as with most users.

[Crusader_Nejaa]

For everyone who wants to vote for the UI style UI/tabs viewers to be an option please go up vote and comment on my idea post that was just approved for votes and comments and spread it as far as you can. Link below

https://connect.mozilla.org/t5/ideas/give-us-the-option-to-use-the-redesigned-3-dot-menu-and-tab/idc...

[WaggleDance]

Please vote on this issue here:

https://connect.mozilla.org/t5/ideas/give-us-the-option-to-use-the-redesigned-3-dot-menu-and-tab/idi...

Mozilla's community manager has accepted it as a vote, whilst these discussions seem to go ignored.

[Omid]

Hi! I really liked the larger tab previews. Can you make it an option please?