Firefox 136 brings vertical labs, improved sidebar, AMD GPU Linux video decoding, and more

Mozilla has released Firefox version 136, introducing several new features and improvements. Users can now access an updated sidebar in the settings, offering quick access to tools such as an AI chatbot, bookmarks, history, and synced tabs. This version also debuts a new vertical tabs layout, displaying open and pinned tabs in the sidebar.

Firefox 136 enhances privacy controls with an option to clear saved form information separately from browsing history. Smartblock Embeds now allows selective unblocking of social media embeds in ETP strict and private browsing modes. The browser also defaults to HTTPS for page loads, with a fallback to HTTP if necessary.

For macOS users, energy efficiency has been improved by moving some background tabs to lower power cores, and hardware-accelerated HEVC video playback is now supported. Linux users benefit from hardware video decoding for AMD GPUs and the availability of Firefox on ARM64, with Flatpak support forthcoming.

The browser's weather forecast feature expands to more regions, including Mexico, Brazil, Argentina, and Chile. Address autofill is now available for UK users. Developer tools see performance boosts with the integration of CodeMirror 6 in the debugger editor. Additionally, Firefox now prefers PNG format for copying images, preserving transparency. iOS users gain support for dark mode in iOS 18 and tinted app icons, as well as a password generator.