Firefox 4 Early Beta Sports HTML5 and WebM Video

By Geoff Duncan Published July 7, 2010

The Mozilla Foundation has taken the wraps off Firefox 4 Beta 1, the latest version of its popular Web browser application. Firefox 3.0 came out all the way back in 2008, while Firefox 3.5 debuted last year. Firefox 4 is aimed at addressing a number of performance and stability issues, improving security, adding support for new Web technologies…and giving the browser a new look and feel.

Image used with permission by copyright holder

Some of the most significant changes for Firefox 4 are under the hood: the browser is implementing support for HTML 5’s flash-free video playback capabilities using Google’s WebM video format, which purports to be unencumbered by patent obligations. The patent issue is key for Mozilla: the non-profit organization has said it does not intend to support H.264 video—the standard currently supported by the likes of Apple’s iPhone and iPad for Flashless Web video—because of patent issues, even though it’s currently available to license under a royalty-free agreement from the MPEG-LA trade group. Firefox 4 beta 1 also incorporates a new look at feel: tabs have been moved to the top of the browser window to get out of the way of Web content, and Windows Vista/7 users will notice the Firefox menu is a single button. These changes haven’t migrated to the Mac and Linux versions yet, however.

Recommended Videos

Under the hood, Firefox 4 sports a new HTML 5 parser and attempts to address a number of performance and stability issues. Firefox 4 includes support for graphics hardware acceleration (WebGL is there, but disabled by default), and a rendering technique called “lazy frame construction” which should reduce the number of cases where a document has to be reflowed within a region—something especially helpful with Web-based applications. The application also sports a new Add-ons Manager, and tweaks the should avoid exposing users’ browsing histories. The browser also brings out-of-process-plugins (OOPP) to Mac OS X for the first time, meaning a plug-in crash doesn’t take out the whole browser. (The technique has been used in Apple’s Safari for a while.)

Firefox 4 Beta 1 is still early in development; users should expect the road to be a bit bumpy as the Mozilla team works towards an official release. Mozilla expects to release new betas every few weeks.

Former Contributor

Geoff Duncan writes, programs, edits, plays music, and delights in making software misbehave. He's probably the only member…

Topics

QuickCharge: This Week in EV

Computing

What’s the Right Laptop for a Student on a $1,000 Budget?

The best college laptop isn't the one with the longest spec sheet. It's the one that fits your budget and the way you'll actually use it.

Dell XPS 14 Review: Sticker

This post is brought to you in paid partnership with Dell

Buying a laptop for college isn't a decision made in isolation. Tuition, textbooks, housing, meal plans, transportation, and course materials all compete for the same budget, leaving most families with one question before the semester begins: how much is enough to spend on a laptop without paying for features that may never get used?

Wearables

Siri is about to hear everything you say, but Apple’s privacy approach has me cautiously on board

Apple's new Audio Intelligence features want to hear almost everything you say. A privacy document released alongside them explains why I am mostly okay with that.

Apple Watch Audio Intelligence features

Apple used its September 2026 launch event to enter a feature category it has mostly avoided until now: ambient listening. Siri Recap, Live Rewind, Music Recognition with Shazam, and Sound Recognition all landed on the Apple Watch Series 12 and Apple Watch Ultra 4. All four depend on the watch microphone picking up sound around you far more often than any previous Apple product has.

Siri Recap listens for conversations throughout your day and turns them into short AI summaries you can check later. Live Rewind is smaller in scope but arguably more useful day-to-day. It transcribes the last 15 seconds of whatever was just said with a double-press of the crown. This is perfect for catching a name, a book title, or directions you missed the first time. Music Recognition uses Shazam to identify songs playing nearby without you lifting a finger, much like Now Playing on Google's Pixel devices. Sound Recognition is a useful accessibility feature that listens for sirens, doorbells, and alarms to alert users who have a hearing impairment.

Computing

Can You Turn a Mini PC Into a Local AI Agent?

Furniture, Table, Computer

This post is brought to you in paid partnership with MSI

Not every AI task needs the scale of the cloud. An employee searching company documents, a retail kiosk answering product questions, or a digital sign reacting to customer behavior all need fast responses, but they don't necessarily need to send every prompt to a remote data center. Running those workloads locally reduces latency, keeps sensitive information closer to where it's generated, and can lower the ongoing cost of AI deployments. As a result, many organizations are moving toward hybrid AI architectures that handle routine requests on-device while reserving cloud models for tasks that genuinely need more processing power.