Waterfox

Name: Waterfox
Rating: 4.1875 (6 reviews)

56.2.12

11 July 2019

High-performance browser based on the Mozilla platform.

Overview

Waterfox, based on the Mozilla platform but created exclusively for 64-bit systems, has one goal in mind: speed. The only thing you may need to consider is that your plug-ins must be 64-bit, also.

Features

Built with Clang-cl on Windows
No Adobe DRM
No Pocket
No data collection
Run every 64-bit plugin
Run every add-on (even unsigned ones!)
Windows XP 64-bit support

Note: While the software is classified as free, it is actually donationware. Please consider making a donation to help support development.

What's new in Waterfox

Version 56.2.12:

Latest security and bug fixes

Waterfox Screenshots

31 Waterfox Reviews

See all

I'll keep this very short and to the point. If you're a Firefox user from way back and use a Mac desktop, you need this. Runs well (very well, in fact), and all of your old add-ons work. I'm unsure why it's so under the radar, as I wish I would have discovered it a year ago instead of mucking around with ESR.

Like (2)

Version 56.2.0

This version has been out for 20 days or so, so this isn't just a first impression. The new icon really looks like a blue fox urinating. I understand that Alex really needs to change the icon, so maybe he can have a "Make My Icon" contest or something. Speaking of which, boy does this thing piss away memory. It launches using a not great but acceptable half gig, but after a day of average usage, it's usually sucking up triple that amount. And, say I wanted to have a baseball game running in the background while I did something more productive. I'm just kidding. That wouldn't be possible with Waterfox. If I tried to switch to another app I'd be looking at a beachball for ten minutes, I can't even imagine what it would be like to try to work while it was playing video.. So unfortunately, Waterfox seems to be outgrowing me at a pretty rapid pace, and I'm constantly forced to use my backup of Opera even though I hate the layout, and I know it's probably logging every move I make, I just need that 1.5 gb of memory for other things.

Version 56.2.11

After Mozilla's grotesque blunder with addons expired certificates, Waterfox confirmed its benefits as a solid and reliable browser. As for the future, news are pretty good: the next big version should continue putting together what is/was good in Firefox, some old extensions are even being updated, as mentioned in the release notes: https://www.waterfox.net/blog/waterfox-56.2.10-release-download/ I salute Mr Alex's dedication to his project and feel more confident than ever about this great successor to Firefox! :-)

Like (1)

Version 56.2.10

Really enjoying Waterfox so far after using it a couple days. I'm not heavy on the add-ons, just a few. But I'm always looking for something decent based on FireFox or WebKit.

Version 56.2.9

Since my precedent review, I had issues with Chromium on some sites, so Waterfox came back to be my main browser, even if Chromium is faster. But moving forward, some XUL extensions started to have issues: MAFF stopped working, FEBE too, now Cookiebro seems to go the same path... XUL support was the main reason why I switched from Firefox Quantum to Waterfox and, though I've achieved a viable Firefox UI through a combination of userChrome.css and theme, plus various tricks to restore my workflow, I still have issues (in particular, the version of 1Password for FFQ won't work with all my other browsers, while an old version works everywhere except for FFQ! :-/ ) The next version of Waterfox is cooking (based on FF68 ESR) and it's very likely that it will break a lot of things. At that point, the gap between Waterfox and Firefox might only be about privacy — which you can achieve with a bunch of addons and tweaks in Firefox, so... Wait and see. ;-)

Like (1)

Version 56.2.9

1 answer(s)

Aargl

21 May 2019

Cookiebro finally had an update that makes it appear again in Waterfox! I was convinced it was the browser's guilt instead, as the error was only present in WFx not in FFx... :-o

Smayer97

13 December 2018

requirements page is down.... cannot tell if I can run it. here: https://waterfoxproject.org/en-US/waterfox/56.2.5/system-requirements/ OR here: https://staging.waterfoxproject.org/en-US/waterfox/56.2.5/system-requirements/

Version 56.2.4

1 answer(s)

Aargl

19 December 2018

Strange enough, the update was pushed to MU even before the dev's site where the DL links still point to 5.2.5...
If anyone wants to DL from the dev's site, this link works: https://storage-waterfox.netdna-ssl.com/releases/osx64/installer/Waterfox%2056.2.6%20Setup.dmg
All should be fixed in a few hours, I bet. ;-)

WTF 56.2.4 is out. Time for a small review. :-) Now that FF Quantum has gone away from me and my use case, I'm still using the last version of Chromium running on OS 10.9 as my main browser, but this will probably change as it's not being updated anymore for that system. Now, I coud call WTF "the old faithful" as it is slowly evolving, integrating security patches from FF, but keeping what I liked in old FF. No doubt it will take the place of Chromium for me, sooner or later. In the meantime, it's my safe choice when Chromium is not satisfactory or buggy on some site.

Version 56.2.3

Jeez, I didn't even know this browser existed until today. I'm glad I found it. I like the older tab style, and it seems to run smoother than the more current version of FF. It's also easy on the CPU (so far, at least). I'm not into using a lot of add-ons, but that seems a nice bonus for other users.

Version 56.2.2

1 answer(s)

Aargl

17 July 2018

Welcome! :-)
Yeah, extensions can become addictive... :-D
I've got little more than 30 of them enabled! Of course, I could live without many of them but it's like an old pair of shoes that makes you feel so comfortable. ;-)
Essential ones:
- Decentraleyes
- uBlock Origin
- uMatrix

Cosmetics or useful ones that I really like:
- Classic Theme Restorer
- Don't track me Google
- Google Analytics Blocker
- F.B. Purity (Cleans up Facebook)
- Keychain Services Integration
- Mozilla Archive Format
- Stylus

I miss a good Dark mode, though, such as Deluminate on Chrome/Chromium (I use Owl, after having had issues with Night Mode Pro — plus Stylus for specific sites such as... MacUpdate!)

After FF Quantum arrived, Chromium progressively became my main browser, but being somewhat experimental, there's always some site that makes me come back to another browser and Waterfox is really my best choice. In rare cases, I launch FF 52ESR or FF 60ESR, rather for checking or seeing how it evolves, in the latter case: for the time being, I can't see enough benefit in FF60ESR, compared to what I'd lose (including my current password manager, which is a fundamental part of my workflow).

Dougster

18 June 2018

Worth using for the extensions that no longer work in Firefox.

Like (1)

Version 56.2.1

Like (2)

Version 56.2.0

2 answer(s)

Iliketrash

30 May 2018

All of your old add-ons DO NOT work!

Aargl

01 June 2018

It's true that not all old addons work but the vast majority of them do.
I'm currently running 31 of them, add 20 more that I fire up when I need them (such as Video DownloadHelper ;-) ).
Now that Firefox 52ESR is coming to its end, Waterfox will be the only option left, anyway,
Instead, don't forget that a lot of old XUL addons have been updated for FF56, so if you stick to FF52ESR you'll have to use non-updated versions. ;-)

Not much to add to my former reviews... ;-) It keeps working perfectly, it runs old XUL addons together with new webextensions (just what Firefox should have done!) and keeps the classic look of old Firefox. I regularly test current Firefox (60 at the time of this writing) and I can't see any good reason to abandon my old habits as it's not even faster — at least on my machine (some say it's faster on recent macs...) The promise of future development is quite enthralling as they plan to incorporate the latest enhancements of Firefox (Multiprocess even with classic add-ons?)

Version 56.2.0

Waterfox

Overview

Features

What's new in Waterfox

Waterfox Screenshots

31 Waterfox Reviews

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