Firefox is switching to a faster release schedule, just like Chrome and Edge

Mozilla Accelerates Firefox Release Schedule

Mozilla Director Sylvestre Ledru confirmed that Firefox will soon adopt a faster release cadence, but said the accelerated release schedule should be considered an "experiment" for now.

The final monthly release will be Firefox 154, which is currently scheduled for August 18. After that, Firefox 155 will arrive on September 1 instead of two weeks later. As a result, Mozilla has completely overhauled the Firefox Release Calendar to accommodate the new bi-weekly schedule.

Rationale Behind the Change

Ledru said the faster release cadence will allow Mozilla developers to ship more "work" on the browser more frequently. Meanwhile, the release process itself should become more predictable, with fewer obstacles affecting rollout plans.

Developers will not need to work twice as fast, however, as half-baked features will still (hopefully) receive the additional attention they need. Ledru's team will monitor this major change to the Firefox release schedule, adjusting the new approach when necessary.

Industry-Wide Trend

Google announced a new bi-weekly release schedule for Chrome in March, explaining that the change would ultimately benefit all parties by improving the security, reliability, and performance of the web platform.

Last month, Microsoft announced that the Edge browser would adopt the same bi-weekly release cadence as Chrome. This was a much easier decision to make, considering that Edge is essentially a proprietary shell built on top of the Chromium project.

Meanwhile, Mozilla continues to use and develop its Gecko layout engine despite Chromium's growing popularity among browser makers.

Community Reaction

Over the past decade, Mozilla has been forced to follow Chrome's design decisions time and time again. Some of those changes were not exactly popular among Firefox enthusiasts, starting with the more restrictive WebExtensions model for browser add-ons.

Judging by the early reactions to Ledru's message, the accelerated release cadence could prove to be controversial as well. Firefox users are once again accusing Mozilla of copying Google's every move, even as the Alphabet-owned company continues to make one questionable decision after another.

Other users have pointed out that Firefox is now going to break things twice as quickly while Mozilla attempts to keep pace with Google's apparent obsession with Chrome's version numbers.