The new Firefox design lands in today. This is what you can expect

[AshleyT]

Firefox has evolved significantly over the past year and now, its look has evolved too. 

The design begins rolling out today, with Firefox 157, bringing a cleaner, more cohesive , and more adaptable experience. It is still the Firefox you know and trust, with the same commitment to independence, privacy, customization, and user control. 

The Mozilla Connect community has helped shape this work from the beginning by sharing feedback on the early designs, tested the experience in Nightly starting in July, filed bugs, and shared with us what worked and what didn’t.

Here’s what landed today.

A cleaner, more cohesive design

• Softer tab shapes
• Redrawn icons that hold up better across light and dark themes
• Rebalanced spacing throughout the interface
• A refreshed color palette featuring the glow of the active tab, deeper purples, and warmer light tones

The updated design brought bolder color choices to Firefox — and your feedback made clear that opinions on browser color run the full spectrum. In response, we created additional themes, accessible through add-ons and a new theme picker off Firefox Home, so you have greater control over how Firefox looks. 

More ways to make Firefox yours

Firefox is becoming more customizable, giving you more ways to shape the browser around how you browse. These options include:

• A new theme picker in the customization panel on the Firefox Home page. Additional community themes remain available through about:addons.
• New Firefox themes and wallpapers
• A dedicated space to pin and organize shortcuts so sites you use all the time stay put.
• Compact Mode for a denser browsing experience

Compact mode now officially supported!

Compact Mode is now available as its own dedicated setting. It will also switch on automatically on smaller screens, reducing the space between interface elements so more fits on the screen.

This is one of the clearest examples of how community feedback shaped Nova. Many of you told us that maintaining a denser interface was important, and we listened.

Faster performance

The refreshed experience also includes improvements to Firefox’s startup, page-loading, and scrolling speeds.

Frequently asked questions

Will my existing themes and add-ons continue to work?

Themes and add-ons should continue to work. Nova is built on the same Firefox foundation, and the extension and theming architecture has not changed.

Will my userChrome.css customizations continue to work?

Some customizations may require minor adjustments, depending on how closely they rely on element names or layout structures from the previous interface. 

But keep in mind that Mozilla does not officially support customizations made through userChrome.css. They can cause unexpected behavior or even break Firefox, and future updates may affect them as Firefox continues to evolve. If you choose to use userChrome.css, please proceed carefully.

You can learn more in Firefox advanced customization and configuration options.

Can I opt out of the update?

The new Firefox design becomes the default experience starting with Firefox 157. However, you have several ways to adjust how Firefox looks and feels, including Compact Mode, themes, wallpapers, and New Tab customization. 

Keep shaping Firefox with us

Nova may be shipping today, but the work doesn’t stop here. Many of these updates grew directly from the bugs you filed and the conversations you started while the design was being developed.

Update to Firefox 157 to try the refreshed experience, then let us know what works well and what could still be improved. Your feedback will continue to help shape what comes next.

[dftf]

In the URL bar, type about:config then press ENTER
Accept any warning shown
Search for nova
Double-click "browser.nova.enabled" to set it to "false"

That will undo most of the changes

[Gonzo-Goliath]

Thank you very much, the old user interface is much clearer and more minimalist. 😍

[Elfener]

Is this why my browser chrome looks like those AI slop websites rather than my system theme like it used to?

Who decided this was a good idea?

[dftf]

To mostly-undo the recent change:

URL bar -> about:config -> ENTER -> accept warning -> search nova ->
double-click line "browser.nova.enabled" to change it to "false"

You can install the previous theme from here:

https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/addon/firefox-proton/ 

[ZCi2Fuxr3Hvj]

The containers tabs are hard to use now, I tried all combinations of available colors and even after setting a theme with high contract background between 4 containers you can't avoid having 2 confusingly close on a regular cheap lcd laptop screen. Don't like the esthetic part either but whatever.

[dftf]

These steps will mostly-undo the recent change:

URL bar -> about:config -> ENTER -> accept warning -> search nova ->
double-click line "browser.nova.enabled" to change it to "false"

And you can get the previous themes here:

https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/addon/firefox-proton/ 

[HstsLover]

PLEASE stop changing the design, not only is it pointless but opening your browser and finding a completely different UI is jarring.

Pick a design and keep it that way, if users aren't satisfied then they can use themes. If you want to give it a new skin then just make a new theme so you don't disrupt users that have already picked one themselves.

[dftf]

To reverse most of the recent change:
URL bar -> about:config -> ENTER -> accept warning -> search nova ->
double-click line "browser.nova.enabled" to change to "false"

You can also install the previous theme here:
https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/addon/firefox-proton/ 

⚠ The ability to reverse Nova may end in Firefox v161, due for release November 24, 2026
Refer to: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=2071454 

[Flame_ONeill]

It looks awful and it's slow.  Fix it.

[dftf]

To mostly-reverse the recent change:
URL bar -> about:config -> ENTER -> accept warning -> search nova ->
double-click line "browser.nova.enabled" to change to "false"

You can also install the previous theme here:
https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/addon/firefox-proton/ 

⚠ The ability to reverse Nova may end in Firefox v161, due for release November 24, 2026
Refer to: https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=2071454 

[yaceq]

You destroyed Firefox with this update. I have to restart it 2 -3 times a day because sites don't load. After restart it's ok. Revert all the changes you've done. They're totaly pointless.

Even now, I had to restart Firefox to add this comment!!!

[dftf]

If sites aren't loading, it's probably an extension causing the issue -- a lot of people in the past two days have had loads of issues with YouTube, and the Ghostery extension was the cause.

See if there are any updates for your extensions:
Menu  ->  Extensions and Themes  ->  click the ⚙ icon  ->  Check for updates...

If any get updated, fully-close all Firefox windows, and bring a new one up.

If you still have issues, a custom DNS server you use might be having issues.

Menu  ->  Settings  ->  type DNS into the search box  ->  under "DNS over HTTPS", click "Custom settings"  ->  check the settings there (e.g. click "Custom" and pick a different provider)

[yaceq]

I've been using Firefox for 20 years and have never experienced something like this. I don't use this extension and all mine extensions are up to date. I use cloudflare DNS. 

This loading problem is very strange because when it appears page loads but for example any button doesn't work. it's on every page after 1st appear. Only restart helps but only for some time when it appears again. 

[dftf]

I'm not having such issues here on the 157.0 version, and cannot see any widespread reports of this so not sure what else might be your cause.

Maybe try backing up your current Firefox data:
Menu -> Settings -> Accounts and Synchronisation -> Backup

Then create a new profile
Menu -> Settings -> Profiles -> Settings -> Manage Profiles -> Create a profile

Then when you're in that new profile, test the same websites

If the issue is resolved, import your data back in:
Menu -> Settings -> Accounts and Synchronisation -> Restore your data

If not, you can always change back to your original profile, with all your data still there

[donburi]

The new border highlight on the active tab is incredibly distracting and calling too much attention to itself.

[dftf]

If you haven't done so already, use these steps to reverse most of the recent change:
URL bar -> about:config -> ENTER -> accept warning -> search nova ->
double-click line "browser.nova.enabled" to change to "false"

You can also install the previous theme here:
https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/addon/firefox-proton/ 

⚠ The ability to reverse Nova may end in Firefox v161, expected Nov 24, 2026
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=2071454 

[p_n]

---

@dftf wrote:

⚠ The ability to reverse Nova may end in Firefox v161, expected Nov 24, 2026
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=2071454 

---

Oh, so it's time to consider switching browsers. Maybe that's the goal... to kill the Firefox project because it costs Mozilla too much.

[dftf]

Google pays Mozilla something like $500million a year to keep Firefox afloat, as then in browser anti-trust hearings they can go "nuh-uh your honour, Firefox exists".

If Firefox suddenly ceased to exist, where else will Mozilla get any money for?  With most e-mail now being web-based, and Microsoft looking to abandon the classic "Outlook" by the end of this decade in-favour-of the free "Outlook (new)" in Windows, I cannot see any company ever donating purely due to Thunderbird.

And beyond those two products, what else does Mozilla have? 🤔

[nubbyv2]

I think the browser feels a little snappier so far.

From a vertical tabs user: I actually prefer the pill shape tabs. However, the spacing is too big and makes it more difficult to select tabs now. I can put my mouse cursor between two tabs and there is still space between the text I am trying to choose. The option to remove the vertical tab scrollbar should be available though. I also think the gradient fading on the right side of the tabs should either be shrunk more horizontally or removed.

[Maxip]

are the random crashes solved instead having now rounded cornors?

Seriously I cannot even put into the Adressline any website url anymore.

Why are you doing that?

[ProtoDan]

Sucks so bad

[DarkMODE]

I don't really care about designs but can I have my dark mode back though? like the previous black dark, not this stupid gradient of blue-orange.

[RCocks]

Please please stop messing with my UI.

I'm not change resistant, but I've had a similar look for decades, every few years we go through a cycle where Mozilla tries to force a change, then backpedals it.

Please stop doing that. It's so tiring. New tabs merge and blend together, are hard to read, the click areas look unfamiliar.

I just want to use my browser without thinking about my browser.

[brad12345]

New design is terrible. No one asked for colors and certainly not a purple/pink gradient. At least let us pick our colors, including just plain old white again. All of the color option themes are too much color.

[shadowhunterxyz]

i decided to make an account just to give me thoughts on this update.

i hate it, bring back rectangle tabs, these ovals suck

[MozillaUpsetsMe]

You can type this into your address bar like you're going to a website:

"about:config"

Search up "browser.nova.enabled" in the menu that appears and click the little double arrow to the right to disable the new look (and maybe other things they added recently. im not a computer person but this turned off the new themes for me)
If you toggle that to "false" it will get rid of the stupid new oval tabs.

[asdf_]

I don't understand how Mozilla can be so utterly out of touch with its user base. Do you guys do zero user research before launching something like this? Is this just because Google pays for everything and you have zero accountability to any real user? How can your organization be this dysfunctional and jump through such hoops to ruin your main product like this? Your entire management chain needs to be let go.

[asdf_]

> bringing a cleaner

Nope.

> more cohesive

Lol? If "cohesive" means "in line with Mozilla's strategy to drive away its last remaining users"

> and more adaptable experience

Right, that's why it's the default experience with no simple opt-out. Adaptable means "we'll shove this update down your throats and you'll like it"?

> It is still the Firefox you know and trust, with the same commitment to independence, privacy, customization, and user control.

Are you even reading what you write...? What better way to retain trust than to force a UI update nobody asked for, that can't be customized and removes user control, and then lie about it to our faces?

Seriously, what is wrong with your organization and its priorities?

[wenceslost]

Forgive me if this is not the right place to leave this feedback, but I've found the updated icons and colors for containers to be less useful than the previous designs.

In my opinion, the design of the containers interface should be geared toward quick identification of the correct container that one wants to use. The previous design, shown in this screenshot from the containers Support page, accomplished this well by using mostly filled icons and bold colors very easy to differentiate from one another.

 The new interface has changed in two main ways: the icons are now all outlines with shaded backgrounds, with no filled icons (they are also simplified, but I have no quarrel with that choice), and the colors are now much more similar to each other. This can be seen in the following screenshots from my own browser (personal info redacted), below. Notably, the new tab interface seems to use dark mode on my device regardless of Firefox's settings.

Interestingly, the "Always Open Site in Container" interface from the Multi-Account Containers extension seems to use a light theme regardless of system settings (I cannot recall if this was the case previously or not) and while it uses the new icons, it uses a different set of more bold.

I have a couple thoughts on the new design:

1. Despite the statement in this thread that "The updated design brought bolder color choices to Firefox", these colors are clearly less bold than the previous colors. This makes them more difficult to differentiate from each other when attempting to select the correct container.
2. The color-shaded circles behind each icon reduce the contrast between the icon and the background, making them less visually legible, particularly at a glance.
3. The bolder colors of the Multi-Account Container extension's interface are much easier for me to differentiate than those of the other container interfaces. Among the light and dark themes of the other interfaces, the light theme colors are easier to differentiate than the dark theme colors due to higher contrast even with the reduced contrast of the shaded circles.
4. Though outlined icons have been in the tech graphics trend for some time, I would argue that in this use, filled icons would be a better choice. If the goal of these icons is for users to quickly differentiate their containers by color and shape, filled icons will give a stronger sense of both to the user, allowing them to more quickly determine their intended container.
5. The icons in the new tab interface are not sized the same as the icons in the container settings compared to their shaded circles. This makes the icons in the new tab interface appear somewhat sloppy.
6. I have yet to do an analysis comparing the performance of the previous color palette to the new color palette in terms of their color blindness accessibility. Though, I suspect that both palettes would not perform well, I'm certain the new palette would perform worse given that my own non-color blind vision is having increased difficulty differentiating them.

Overall, these are my recommendations for improving readability and ease-of-use:

1. Remove the shaded circles behind icons.
2. Choose a color palette that a) contrasts more strongly with the background, b) contrasts more strongly with each other, and c) performs better for people with color vision issues.
3. Switch to filled, rather than outlined icons.
4. Fix the different interfaces not following light/dark themes and unify the colors across built-in containers and the extension (if these bugs are actually my own errors, please let me know).
5. Nice to have (even from before this update): More color choices and more icons, yay!

In my opinion, the updated design of the container icons and colors seems to put form ahead of function to the detriment of the user.

[AnonymousGoblin]

Thanks, I hate it. I hate it all.

• The color gradient theme: No option to restore what I had before — not even so much as an option to NOT have a color gradient at all.
• Browser tabs: Yet again not having clear separation nor borders, while also appearing as free-floating. It seems the developers went so far as to remove the options.  Does Mozilla just hate people like me?
• I swear the font size for the bars keeps shrinking with every "revamp". I'm vision-impaired, by the way.
• Toolbar: No, I didn't have nor did I want the sidebar button added to my toolbar. So now I have to undo it. Again. Quit automatically adding stuff to my toolbar!
• Menu bar: Pretty sure I didn't have the annoying "Profiles" menu option in the menu bar previously, but either way I don't want it. And no customize option to remove optional and unwanted menu bar clutter...
• Overall style: Why does everything have to be rounded and looking flat as a pancake?! Give native options here instead of forcing users to search online for solutions!

I've had to do some searching online and so far every article is saying the same thing: Telling me to go into about:config and basically disable anything with "nova" in it, since that is apparently the design name for this piece of turd. Unfortunately, doing so does not fix every problem with "Nova" (not even close).

"Firefox is becoming more customizable," — Lies

[MozillaUpsetsMe]

Please don't force UI updates, the nova looks so bad and feels like you're just trying to fit in with what you think looks futuristic but nobody asked for this. Please make it optional in the future.

[Defpotec]

As designs shift, I've gotten more and more annoyed by anything with round corners. It feels as if I'm treated as an infant who needs a user interface baby-proofed. This becomes doubly so insulting when the Firefox update page prominently directs me to a button in which I can custom tailor my UI experience and there's no available toggle or slider to assign the degree of sharpness of corner.

I should never feel required to dive into the about:config section just to return to a begrudging degree of UI acceptability. Even the previous design has corners, not sharp edges, in my browser tabs and mouse hovers. I simply want my UI to look as flat and sharp as a rectangle in Geometry class. Please let me have that.

[anotherBob]

At this point, there has been nothing done to address the negative criticism in any way that is meaningful to me, and it looks like Mozilla is committed to this UI and will be disabling the only thing that would make me consider staying in Firefox. 
https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=2071454

I will share my final thoughts, even though I don't particularly feel like my feedback or much of the other feedback I've read is being valued outside of requests for very specific adjustments within Nova. I enjoyed Firefox because of the ability to customize. I do not actually enjoy customizing. Once I customize something to my liking, I do not like having to reconfigure it again. So I am switching something allowing customization that offers an option of a mature UI that is less prone to updates. I get that it can be necessary sometimes, but I don't see that necessity here. Additionally, it shipped with numerous bugs in place, and is going to continue to roll out updates to the UI for the immediate future, meaning any customization I do now may or may not require rework.

I quite literally feel tired when thinking about the myriad of tiny adjustments over time that I would need to do to retain what I consider a functional and aesthetically pleasing UI/UX. I am sure that whatever plan you settle down with will probably have some long term stability after a little while, but I don't know how long that little while is going to be. I am actually a little sad. I originally got Firefox somewhere in the ballpark of 17 or 18 years ago. Even in that time, there had been disruptive updates, but I had felt some confidence that it was necessary under the hood to justify the disruption, so I stuck with it. I don't have that same confidence now.

I get the impression that Mozilla is hoping that UI/UX changes might help draw in more users. I genuinely wish you well in that regard and hope you cut into Chrome's market share with the flaming sword of Michael. The bottom line is that Firefox is no longer my browser.

I hope this feedback provides useful information and perspective about why at least this long-time user has decided to leave.

[JimmyKills]

I very much dislike this new UI design, it makes things look like a crap version of browsers I have opted out of using. I dislike the ovalization, I dislike that tabs feel hidden IN THE TAB BAR because they BLEND IN WHEN THEY ARE NOT THE FOCUSED TAB, and I very much dislike that there is no option to revert to a more classic look. Even IF someone made a theme to mimic some of it the more preferable will always be just being able to default out of this crap. 

[hempshark]

as for a person that uses firefox from first release this update is an insult. total f up and disregards of any option for users to use old design, and new design is, oooohhh boy, if you think it WOWSY new guys will show up, nah yo f'd up. seems like I will search for a firefox fork from someone who doesn't do this. Just imagine, this change was so bad that I had to use shady login system to find some kind of form to reply. that's speaks alot. 

[cadwellm]

Here is my feedback on this abysmal Nova update:

• It's lousy looking with the rounded tabs
• The rounded tabs make it more difficult to click into when one has a disability because there is less usable space because the corners are gone
• I was using a dark theme that I liked and used for years, all the text on the tabs was white as was the outline on the active tab - but nova made the white text and outline on the active tab turn black so I couldn't read it. Meaning I had to waste my time hunting down a different dark theme I could use that wouldn't do this
• Where is the easy way to opt out of this crap?
• I went to about:config and turned Nova off. 
• First came the really stupid 'Smart Window' and made my theme turn purple and took me directly to Google Search...how useless is that! And now this Nova crap.
• You do realize there are other browsers out there...don't you? I can easily start using a Firefox fork and get rid of FireFox entirely. What will Firefox do if enough people jump ship?
• STOP with the crappy looks and start working on the important stuff like keeping your users safe. LEAVE our setups alone! If we want square tabs then we should be able to have square tabs - just remember, not everyone is using Firefox on their **bleep** phone!
  
  Update: I just cloned Waterfox to be just like my Firefox. If Firefox doesn't change the UI back to the way it should be, and removes the option in about:config to change NOVA to false, then I will be enjoying my Waterfox browser instead.

[mjlamont]

God why would you go for "softer tab shapes". Let us decide what our tabs look like, I hate this. 

[ChuckTheNinja]

Congrats to this update for being the update that made me turn off auto updates

Edit: Oh my god I might just jump ship. You people actually made your forums auto subscribe to any post you comment on. You actually think people want a notification for every single post someone else makes that is not even in reply to them. You are incompetent. 

[TexanTom]

yeap....nightmare. Had to come turn off all the subscriptions.  One way to get users to participate is to force them to.

[dftf]

---

You people actually made your forums auto subscribe to any post you comment on. You actually think people want a notification for every single post someone else makes that is not even in reply to them.

---

Yes, the decision to default to "notify me on the site about absolutely every update" and "e-mail me about every single update" is really baffling.

E-mails should default to "when someone replies to me" or "when an answer is chosen to a question I post, or have subscribed to".  And for notifications on here, I'd say it's fine to default to "when someone replies to a post I've also replied on", but a notification for every Kudos (aka Like) is crazy!

You can manage them here:
https://connect.mozilla.org/t5/user/myprofilepage/tab/user-subscriptions:notification-settings 

Tick all of these...
Turn off all push notifications
Turn off all email notifications
Turn off all real-time pop-up notifications
Turn off all mobile notifications
...then scroll to the bottom and tap Save and enjoy the silence!