Firefox 83 for Mac Brings HTTPS-Only Mode, Pinch to Zoom, and Performance Improvements

Mozilla has released Firefox 83 on Mac, bringing new features and improvements, including a new HTTPS-Only Mode, pinch to zoom, and more.

HTTPS-Only Mode is Mozilla's latest security feature that ensures users establish fully secure connections to every website they visit. If a website doesn't support the HTTPS encrypted protocol, Firefox asks for user permission before connecting.

Enabling HTTPS-Only Mode is done through the Preferences menu (the three lines icon in the top-right corner of the browser). Select Privacy & Security and scroll down to the section HTTPS-Only Mode. Then choose Enable HTTPS-Only Mode in all windows.

A new pinch zooming feature also comes to Firefox on Mac. Users can now pinch to zoom using a trackpad to zoom in and out of webpages.

Elsewhere, Picture-in-Picture now supports keyboard shortcuts for fast forwarding and rewinding videos. The arrow keys can now be used to move forward and back 15 seconds, along with volume controls. For a list of supported commands see Support Mozilla.

Mozilla has also improved functionality and design for a number of Firefox search features, and improved page load performance by up to 15%, page responsiveness by up to 12%, and reduced memory usage by up to 8%.

Part of the JavaScript engine that helps to compile and display websites has also been replaced, improving security and maintainability of the engine at the same time.

Firefox 83 is available to download from the Mozilla website and works on Apple Silicon CPUs via emulation under Apple's Rosetta 2 that ships with macOS Big Sur. Mozilla says it is working toward Firefox being natively-compiled for these CPUs in a future release.