Firefox’s new ‘Nova’ redesign will be enabled for all users in Firefox 157, due the end of September – barring any last minute hiccups, of course.
Mozilla’s engineers have been working on Nova since March. The original pitch was for rounded UI elements, floating toolbars, framed web content no longer flush with the edges of the browser window and, more strikingly, a lot of pastel gradients.
Those changes have been refined and dialled down during the past few months, as you can see in this comparison (drag the handle to compare):
Roundness was lightly reigned in, ‘gaps’ to segment and float toolbars from content quietly closed, the default gradient made a little softer and a compact mode option re-added to let users who want to deflate the increased padding, do so.
Avid Firefox watched Dominic H – thanks for the tip, btw – left a comment below my Firefox 155 release post to quip that the decision to lose the gaps from Nova means it’s now just a “rounder Proton” with gradients – but even those are absent in stock on Linux: –
Gradients in Nova‘s window chrome help shift the browser’s aesthetic in a “trend”-y way. Similar roundness and gradients are used in newer versions of Google’s Material You on Android and Apple’s contentious Liquid Glass design on macOS and iOS.
Other UI changes compliment Nova in Firefox, like the recent Settings redesign, in-browser art using the new Firefox mascot Kit as well as user-facing features like Smart Window and widgets on the New Tab page – most of those in place.
The original Nova mockups from March showed an opinionated take, but we’re getting a far polite translation in Firefox 157.
Opinions, naturally, will vary on whether Firefox even needed a redesign, much less this specific one. Based on past trends, it was was overdue: ‘Australis’ came in 2014, followed by the ‘Photon’ redesign in 2017 and the ‘Proton’ revamp in 2021.
Nova will be enabled in Firefox 157 per current plans (plans can change, of course).
Don’t want to wait? You don’t need to. You can enable Nova in current stable releases of Firefox via a hidden flag in about:config, search for browser.nova.enabled and set it to true.
If you do opt to test it early, keep in mind the Nova you try will have some differences to the version coming in v157 (try a nightly build for a more accurate idea).
Real opinion will have to form once the Firefox 157 release on 29 September hits.
Thanks Dominic