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]

You can bring compact mode back in previous versions by typing about:config in the URL bar, accept any warning, search for "browser.compactmode.show" and set it to "true".  You'll then find the option if you right-click an empty area of the tab-bar or URL bar, and click Customise Toolbars.

You could move to the "ESR" version of Firefox, then do the above to use Compact Mode there.

https://tips.navas.us/2026/10/firefox-ui-debacle.html 

[Obs]

Truly, this new update UI is hideous enough to inspire me to register an account just to inform you that your team failed miserably.  This is atrocious.  Stop forcing your terrible sense of aesthetics on me.

[MozillaUser1234]

same lol. They are messing up bad. Made it 20 years without a firefox account.

[dftf]

At-least now you have a Mozilla account, you can use it to sign into Firefox to use the 50GB of free VPN each month 😉

[JNavas]

True, but Mozilla free 'VPN' is limited:

• Encrypted proxy, not true VPN.
• Protects browser traffic only, not other apps & services.
• Adds little protection to HTTPS.
• Limited server footprint. 
• No port forwarding.
• Inconsistent geo block bypass.

I personally don't consider it a good substitute for real VPN

[dftf]

Um... okay?  I mean it's a VPN inside the browser, so it won't do port-forwarding or system-wide protection as it's not a VPN app.  That doesn't make it bad though.

As for "Encrypted proxy, not true VPN", that's true of the "VPN" in the Opera Browser (at-least, the Android app).  Even with their one on, I'd still get messages telling me the site was blocked in my country.  Never had that issue with the Firefox one though.  If it was essentially just doing a VPN for the DNS lookup part only, then sites should still get blocked by your ISP, as they can still see the web-traffic.  But I've never once had that happen.  You're sure the free VPN is just a glorified proxy / DNS masking?

[JNavas]

> You're sure the free VPN is just a glorified proxy / DNS masking?

DNS is protected by private DNS, but it's not a factor in geoblocking, which is typically based on IP.

By 'inconsistent geo block bypass' I mean that it sometimes works and sometimes does not. It depends on the thoroughness of the remote checking and the particular proxy server.

[dftf]

Whether it is a "VPN" or not, I can say I've had no issues with it:
•  if I visit a site blocked in my country, I can access the site
•  the sites I go on do have messages (e.g. cookie consents) matching the VPN country

So... if I can access sites that'd be otherwise blocked, seems to do what most users would expect to use it for?

Whereas the free "VPN" in the Android Opera (not Opera Mini) browser:
•  sites would still identify my own country, not the virtual-location
•  some sites would still show a blocked message from my ISP / mobile Internet

So the one in Firefox seems to actually work from what I can see?

And they do offer a system-wide VPN, if that's what anyone needs:
https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/products/vpn/ 

[JNavas]

> And they do offer a system-wide VPN, if that's what anyone needs

Yes, Mozilla offers a paid VPN service as well, but it's limited to wireguard, no other protocols, and does not have a raw option, so you are forced to use Mozilla software as opposed to the true wireguard client. Those are part of the reasons! I do not consider it a good paid VPN option.

I use and recommend Private Internet Access (PIA) VPN.

[dftf]

Fair-enough, don't use it then 🤷🏻‍♂️

[JNavas]

> Fair-enough, don't use it then 🤷🏻‍♂️

I use and recommend Private Internet Access (PIA) VPN.

[rw335i]

I use ExpressVPN. Easy to turn on or off and easy to select any of their server sites, US & world as needed. The basic plan, all I need, is now $83.72 for a 28 month commitment. And you can use it for up to 10 devices on your network. Throughput speed has been excellent, almost as good as my non-VPN connection. You can exclude applications that don't like the connection originating from out side the local area. I exclude Thunderbird for Spectrum email.

[MozillaUser1234]

lol perfect for all my VPN needs. Such as viewing my Yahoo and looking up my Mapquests. The funny part is since scrapping Google, the second half is not sarcastic.

[Defender77]

There is a saying that "the best is the enemy of the good," and it applies perfectly to this situation: altering the design for the sake of aesthetics—which matter to only a few—at the expense of performance spoils the user experience for the vast majority. Firefox’s main advantage over other browsers has always been its reliability and speed, free from the superfluous services that collect usage statistics and place an unnecessary load on the user's system; unfortunately, we are seeing Firefox inch closer to Google Chrome with every new update. Please do not clutter the browser with an unnecessary interface or rarely used services; instead, let users decide what they need and install the specific extensions they require.

[MozillaUser1234]

So much for "open-source" if they just become Google, right?

[dftf]

The good-thing about Firefox being open-source is anyone can "fork" it.

One of these "forks" may have a UI and roadmap more to someone's liking,
so look into them and if any look-good, install them and they should offer an
option to import your current Firefox data when you first open them:
Basilisk • Floorp • Librewolf • Pale Moon • Waterfox

[everwinter23]

I dislike the rounded tabs. They were perfectly fine the way they were. Replicating apple's design or at least moving towards glass aesthetics to trade in functionality for looks is a step in the wrong direction.

I'm really disappointed that this got past QA. Some designs only look good in figma.

[dftf]

> "Replicating apple's design ..."

Pretty-much nails it.  I'd bet nearly everyone in the Firefox team based in the US all use Macs, so macOS is what they know.  So the latest Firefox 157.0.1 probably looks great when used on macOS, but odd on Windows 11 or 10, or various Linux distros.  They need to test on other systems.

[TexanTom]

No, it stinks on my Mac as it does on my windows work comp.  It all around sucks.

[Jason2025]

The new UI is terrible. The rounded corners give the feeling of being constricted and constrained. Thankfully it can be disabled but PLEASE, please don't let the ability to use the old look go away, and indeed, add a switch to the visual settings so we can. If it becomes unchangeable, I will be looking for a new browser.

[dftf]

Alternate options to Firefox, which are still built from the Firefox code, include:
Basilisk • Floorp • Librewolf • Pale Moon • Waterfox

[bhmantan]

I made an account just so I can say how stupid the decision to force this new theme is. That how stupid it is.

[dftf]

You can reverse it in about:config , but only until later this-year.

One option is to move to a version of Firefox called "ESR", which is aimed at businesses.  See:
https://tips.navas.us/2026/10/firefox-ui-debacle.html 

[Counselor]

Sorry, but I really think this redesign doesn't look good at all... 😕 It's just too round everywhere imho.

[dftf]

You can move to the ESR 153.4 version to avoid it for around 12-15 months from now.

See: https://tips.navas.us/2026/10/firefox-ui-debacle.html 

[BananaPants]

I use loads of tab groups in the vertical tab mode and even in compact mode, the new design makes the group bubble take up WAY more vertical space than it used to. I want a way to toggle it back to the slimmer tab group option.

I'm sure folks worked hard on this but I've been around long enough to see software go through this "make it all rounded" followed by a "new, sleeker, not rounded design" cycle multiple times. The designers can't make everyone happy. Maybe there's a way to have more personalization options than just "compact" and "standard." Let me keep my top bar on standard but vert tabs more compact. (and back to the way it was before 157, taking up the same height as a regular tab)

[JNavas]

There is a simple UI solution to Nova (at least for the next year or two) which is to switch from regular Firefox to Firefox ESR (Extended Support Release), which retains the classic Proton UI and is more stable. You can download ESR release 153.4.0 (not the earlier version) here: https://www.firefox.com/download/all/desktop-esr/

[BananaPants]

Vertical tabs, tab groups getting way too big. Here are two of my own screenshots side by side, from 2025 vs 2026. There was a design change inbetween that made the tab groups even smaller but I couldn't find an image with that and had to go with this low-res one on the left. But that's the option I want back. The groups are there for me to revisit later, they don't need to take up so much space.

[dftf]

If you don't like the new Nova look, you can reverse it for now with these steps:
URL bar -> about:config -> ENTER -> accept warning -> search nova ->
double-click line "browser.nova.enabled" to change to "false"

If you like it, but want to reduce some of the spacing, then right-click an
empty area in the tab-bar or to either-side of the URL bar, choose "Customise
Toolbar" and set "Density" at the bottom to "Compact", then click Save.

If you don't see "Density" there, go into about:config, search for compact and
then set "browser.compactmode.show" to "true"

[zz47]

Have to say that the newly deisgned tab is really really ugly. Looks like countless sausages lined-up on the tab bar, and I thought I'd walked into a butcher's shop.

[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"

Previous theme available here:
https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/addon/firefox-proton/ 

[JNavas]

The best solution to the ugly Nova UI (at least for the next year) is to switch from regular Firefox to Firefox ESR (Extended Support Release), which retains the classic Proton UI and is also more stable.

You can download ESR release 153.4.0 (not the earlier version) here: https://www.firefox.com/download/all/desktop-esr/

Then switch from Auto updates to manual updates to keep that version while still installing important security updates.

[devnull-1723]

I loathe nova. For the first time in at least a decade, I'm considering alternatives to firefox. I've found the about:config workaround. I shouldn't need to dig that deep to get rid of this slop.

[dftf]

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

 Long-term though, yes, look into a Firefox "fork", such as one of these:
Basilisk • Floorp • Librewolf • Pale Moon • Waterfox

[JNavas]

The best solution to the ugly Nova UI (at least for the next year) is to switch from regular Firefox to Firefox ESR (Extended Support Release), which retains the classic Proton UI and is also more stable.

You can download ESR release 153.4.0 (not the earlier version) here: https://www.firefox.com/download/all/desktop-esr/

Then switch from Auto updates to manual updates to keep that version while still installing important security updates.

[ValentineFlower]

It looks very... disgusting...
I really do not like the new design and I want to go back to the older version. I do not understand why all of the rounded edges everywhere would make it good. It is just ugly in my opinion.
This morning whenI booted my laptop and started Firefox I was like "Wait... WTF?!?! Did something install a **bleep**ty vibe-coded browser or what??!?!". After that I realized that it is Firefox and I was just crying for 5 minutes straight because of how **bleep**ty it looks.

[dftf]

No need to cry 😭, just undo the 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/  

[JNavas]

The best solution to the ugly Nova UI (at least for the next year) is to switch from regular Firefox to Firefox ESR (Extended Support Release), which retains the classic Proton UI and is also more stable.

You can download ESR release 153.4.0 (not the earlier version) here: https://www.firefox.com/download/all/desktop-esr/

Then switch from Auto updates to manual updates to keep that version while still installing important security updates.

[Hyperion84]

I thought my screen was acting up again. Last time, there was an orange glow at the bottom; now it’s in the top-right corner. I might eventually get used to the orange borders, but not the orange area on the right. Or is my screen actually the problem?

[dftf]

If you like the new Nova look, but not the colour, you could get the previous theme here:
https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/addon/firefox-proton/ 

Or see all themes made by Mozilla here:
https://addons.mozilla.org/firefox/search/?promoted=line&type=statictheme