PINE64 has been building budget-friendly ARM and RISC-V hardware since 2015, when the original PINE A64 single-board computer launched on Kickstarter. The community-driven outfit has since put out devices like the PinePhone, the ROCK series of SBCs, and the Ox64 RISC-V board.
And now with the PineVoice, they are stepping into the smart speaker space, going the Home Assistant way instead of bundling Alexa or Google Assistant.
🚧
PINE64 points out that this device is still in the early stages of development and might have some snafus.
What does it pack?
Built specifically as a voice satellite (basically a relay) for Home Assistant and not a general-purpose smart speaker, the PineVoice's horsepower comes from the Bouffalo Lab BL606P.
Which is a RISC-V SoC that pairs a 480 MHz 64-bit T-Head C906, a 320 MHz 32-bit T-Head E907, and a 150 MHz 32-bit T-Head E902 core.
For the memory, PINE64 includes 32 MiB of pSRAM and 788KB of SRAM, along with 16 MiB of XSPI NOR flash for storage, and wireless connectivity is handled via 802.11 b/g/n WiFi and Bluetooth 5.2 (BT+BLE).
Wake word detection runs locally through MicroWakeWord, currently using the "Hey Jarvis" model from ESPHome instead of routing audio through a cloud server. The firmware speaks the Wyoming Protocol, which is how Home Assistant's voice interface talks to satellite devices like PineVoice.
A dual microphone array handles audio capture, a built-in speaker outputs audio with physical buttons for volume, and a hardware switch handles mic mutes. A center LED ring shows what PineVoice is doing at any given moment, and these light patterns are said to replace spoken responses from the speaker for most actions and states.
The whole thing measures 65 mm x 65 mm x 66 mm and connects over a single USB-C port that handles both power and data.
Get one
PineVoice is in stock now for $49.99 at the Pine Store's community price, with a $59.99 retail price for those buying elsewhere. It ships with a USB-A to USB-C cable in the box (as shown above), and PINE64 backs the device with a 30-day warranty.
Additionally, the source code for PineVoice's firmware can be found on Codeberg and the specification sheet on the documentation portal.
Canonical's Livepatch can now patch the Linux kernel on ARM64 systems without forcing a reboot. This has been possible on AMD64 machines for years, but ARM64 users had no equivalent option until now.
It is available for users on Ubuntu 26.04 LTS and Ubuntu Core 26, and if this sounds familiar, that's because Canonical has already talked about this before. The first time was when the Ubuntu 26.04 release was out, back in April, and the second instance was when Ubuntu Core 26 arrived.
We are covering this now because they have put out a dedicated writeup explaining the effort that went behind getting this ready.
Work started back in 2023, where the company ran a gap analysis (a study of what's missing) on what ARM64 needed to support live kernel patching, and the results weren't very encouraging.
The issue was that the upstream ARM64 kernel lacked a stable implementation of reliable stacktraces, a feature livepatching depends on to know when it's safe to swap code in a running kernel.
The compiler toolchain wasn't ready either, with GCC, objdump, and Kpatch all missing stable ARM64 support at the time. Work picked up through 2024 and into this year as Arm processors became more common in cloud and edge deployments.
Upstream kernel maintainers, hardware vendors, and Canonical's own engineers had to step up for closing those gaps. By late February, the ARM64 Livepatch client was already applying patches in Canonical's test environments for Ubuntu 26.04 LTS and Ubuntu Core 26.
Why should you Livepatch?
Some bug was preventing me from enabling Livepatch on a VM.
Livepatch comes as part of Ubuntu Pro, Canonical's subscription that bundles security patching, support, and compliance tools all while also covering the kernel by patching critical and high-severity vulnerabilities.
You don't need to pay for any of this if you just want to try it out, since Canonical offers Livepatch free for personal use on up to five machines. That should cover most home setups and small server fleets without forking over payment details.
The real advantage shows up once you are managing more than a handful of machines, because instead of scheduling downtime to patch a kernel vulnerability, Livepatch applies the fix in-memory and lets administrators decide when each machine gets the update.
It isn't a complete replacement for patching, though, since Livepatch only touches the kernel. Canonical still recommends rebooting every so often regardless, because long uptimes pile up memory leaks and other state issues that a livepatch can't clear.
None of this really matters if you are a desktop user who restarts their machine fairly regularly, since Livepatch is built for systems where a reboot means real downtime and risk of cost overruns.
When I first heard about Niri, a Rust-powered, scrollable-tiling Wayland compositor with a supposedly different take on window management, I was both skeptical and intrigued.
Niri is not your typical tiling window manager. It describes itself as a "scrollable-tiling Wayland compositor," and that one word, scrollable changes everything.
Traditional tiling WMs like i3 or Sway divide your screen into a fixed grid. Every time you open a new window, all the existing ones get reshuffled and resized. If you have ever lost track of your editor because Firefox decided to squish it into a 200-pixel-wide column, you know exactly how jarring that can be.
Niri works differently. Windows are arranged in columns on an infinite horizontal strip that extends to the right. Opening a new window never causes existing windows to resize. You simply scroll sideways to bring other windows into view, much like flipping through pages on a tablet.
Scrollable tiling example in Niri (screenshot from their GitHub repo)
The project is inspired by PaperWM, a GNOME Shell extension that brings scrollable tiling to GNOME. The motivation behind writing a standalone compositor, rather than another GNOME extension, was to isolate workspaces per monitor properly. With Niri, each display has its own discrete set of workspaces that never bleed into one another.
And crucially, it is written entirely in Rust. Which could be a deciding point for some.
Installing Niri
Niri's availability varies across distributions. I found it packaged on Fedora, Arch Linux, and Ubuntu.
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I'm using Ubuntu 26.04 VM to test the full Niri window manager experience. For virtualization, I'm using QEMU/KVM along with virt-manager GUI.
If you are on Ubuntu, you will need to install it from a custom PPA or build it from source.
Once installed, you can get a first impression of Niri by simply running a command niri while staying in the current Gnome or XFCE session. Later, you can launch Niri from your display manager (login screen).
At first boot, you are greeted by a hotkey overlay, a quick cheat sheet of default keybindings that I found genuinely useful. If you prefer to skip it on subsequent launches, a single config line handles that.
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A glimpse of using Niri Window Manager in Ubuntu 26.04
To get a feel, you can start pressing Alt+T a couple of times. This will open multiple instances of your default terminal emulator, allowing you to navigate different windows by pressing Alt + arrow keys, the Alt+hl Vim binding, or using the mouse scroll button.
The Scrollable Tiling Experience
I discovered the real appeal of Niri only after I stopped trying to use it like a traditional tiling WM. This mental model shift is important.
Rather than dividing my screen into regions, I started thinking in terms of a horizontal timeline of work. On the left, my text editor. Scroll right a bit in the terminal. Further right, browser, documentation, another terminal. Each workspace is its own infinite strip, and each monitor has its own independent set of workspaces. It felt a lot like having a very wide desk that you can slide across.
In traditional tiling setups, every time I opened a new window, I would mentally recalculate where things had moved. In Niri, nothing moved. What was on the left stayed on the left. New things appeared to the right.
Window resizing is still possible. You can adjust column widths and toggle preset sizes with keybindings. Niri also supports floating windows, which can be toggled per window via a keybinding or set as default through window rules. I used floating windows for things like file manager dialogs and calculator apps that feel awkward in a tiled layout.
The workspaces are dynamic and arranged vertically (similar to GNOME's workspace model), while windows scroll horizontally within each workspace. It is a two-axis system, and I experienced it as surprisingly intuitive once the initial learning curve passed.
Configuration
Niri uses a KDL-based configuration file, typically located at ~/.config/niri/config.kdl. KDL is a document language similar in spirit to JSON or TOML but with a different syntax. I found it clean and readable, though it is not something every user will be familiar with right away.
The configuration is comprehensive. You can define:
Keybindings for almost every action
Window rules to set default sizes, floating state, or opacity per application
Animations for window open/close, workspace switching, and scrolling
Input settings for keyboard, touchpad, and mouse
Output configuration for multi-monitor setups, including scale, mode, and position
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When you're exploring Niri, you don't need to define any new configuration. The default configuration options are good to go for most users.
There is dedicated documentation on configuration. It walks through the config format with clear examples. Hot-reloading the config works via niri msg action reload-config, which makes tweaking much less painful than the "restart and hope" workflow of some other WMs.
One area I noted needs third-party tools: bars, notification daemons, and app launchers are not included. Niri is strictly the compositor. You bring your own Waybar, your own mako or dunst, your own wofi or rofi-wayland.
For experienced users, that modularity is a feature. For newcomers, it can feel like a lot to wire up.
That is precisely where Dank Linux comes in.
Enter Dank Linux: Turning Niri Into a Complete Desktop
Setting up a full Niri desktop from scratch, including bar, launcher, notifications, and theming, can take hours of configuration. I discovered Dank Linux as a project that elegantly solves this problem.
Dank Linux is not a distribution. It is a modern desktop suite built primarily around Niri (with also support Hyprland, Sway, MangoWC, labwc, and Miracle WM). At its heart is DankMaterialShell (DMS), a complete desktop shell featuring dynamic theming, smooth animations, a spotlight-style launcher, a control center, a system monitor, and beautiful widgets.
Getting started is almost embarrassingly easy:
curl -fsSL https://install.danklinux.com | sh
That single command brings up an interactive installer that handles dependencies, sets up DMS, configures your chosen compositor (I selected Niri), and even lets you pick your preferred terminal from the list: Ghostty, Kitty, or Alacritty.
Step 1
At first glance, the Dank Linux installer will ask you to choose your favorite window manager. Currently, it provides you with two options, i.e., Niri and Hyprland. Of course, I'll go with Niri this time.
Step 2
Next, choose your default terminal emulator from the list.
Step 3
It will provide you with a dependency check if any additional necessary needs need to be installed. You can toggle your selection for installation with the Space key.
Step 4
Dank Linux installer will prompt for privilege escalation. I'll go with the sudo option.
Dank Linux asking for privilege escalation
Step 5
The installer will also prompt you to replace the existing Niri config.kdl file.
Step 6
Finally, after the setup is complete, you'll get to see the message saying "Your system is ready" and be provided with a couple of commands to view its logs.
Now, it's time to log out and log back into our new Dank Linux environment. You can even first test the whole setup while staying on the Gnome desktop environment.
I tried booting directly into Niri and got stuck on the black screen issue for a couple of days. The issue was that I had been testing it in a VM, and I first needed to enable 3D acceleration in the VM.
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Here's a quick troubleshooting tip. Ensure you have 3D acceleration configured on your machine either a physical or a VM. Check niri logs for any message related to /dev/dri.
Make sure to set Listen type to None and tick the checkbox next to OpenGL in Display Spice options to enable 3D acceleration if you're using QEMU/KVM.
To enable 3D acceleration, enable Listen type to None and enable OpenGL in Virt Manager
Also, you need to make changes to Video Virtio.
What DankMaterialShell Brings
After the installer finished, I experienced one of those rare moments where a Linux desktop setup just looks good out of the box. Here is what DMS provides:
Dynamic Material You Theming
Powered by matugenDMS extracts a colour palette directly from your wallpaper and applies Material Design 3 colour schemes across the entire desktop, including system applications. Switch your wallpaper, and the whole UI recolors itself. It supports automatic light/dark mode switching too, and I found the color transitions genuinely elegant.
Dank Dash
A sidebar dashboard that surfaces media controls, weather, a calendar, and system information at a glance. It is the kind of widget panel that looks like it belongs on a premium Chromebook, not a tiling WM.
Spotlight Launcher
An application launcher that supports filesystem search and is extensible through plugins. I discovered it launches apps noticeably faster than rofi on the same hardware.
Settings
Quick toggles for Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, night light, and other system settings. It mirrors the kind of control center you see in macOS or GNOME.
System Monitor (Dank GOP)
System Monitor on Niri and Dank Linux Environment
Real-time monitoring of CPU, memory, GPU, disk, and network is presented in a clean overlay that does not require opening a separate terminal window.
Dank Search (dsearch)
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Dank search (dsearch) in Dank Linux lets you search filesystems from the launcher
Though you need to install it manually, it's a blazingly fast filesystem search tool, available both from the launcher and as a standalone CLI. When using from the launcher, you can use / to begin file search.
Dank Greeter
A polished login screen (greetd greeter) that matches the rest of the DMS aesthetic, so the visual consistency starts from the moment you boot.
In case you're still getting the default gdm3 login screen or failed to install Greeted at the installation prompt, you can do so with the following command:
dms greeter install
sudo systemctl start greetd
The DMS documentation is well organized and covers compositor-specific setup, keybind configuration through IPC, theming, plugin development, and CLI usage. Running dms setup After installation, it generates starter configs for both Niri and your chosen terminal, and dms doctor runs a diagnostic if something goes wrong.
For Niri specifically, DMS integrates tightly, including IPC-based keybind hooks and compositor blur support. The Niri community maintains a Discord server, and DankMaterialShell has its own subsection there, which I found active and helpful.
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Niri is Wayland-only. If you rely on X11-only applications, you will need XWayland. Niri supports XWayland, but you might face issues with older apps.
In The End...
Niri's scrollable tiling approach solves real friction in the traditional tiling workflow. It gives you a compositor that is both memory-safe (It's Rust afterall) and impressively stable.
Paired with Dank Linux's DankMaterialShell, it becomes a complete, visually coherent desktop that can genuinely compete with mainstream desktop environments on aesthetics while leaving them far behind on efficiency.
Is it for everyone? Nah! If you are new to Linux desktops, the setup complexity (even with Dank Linux's one-liner) assumes some familiarity. But if you are a tiling WM user who has ever been frustrated by windows jumping around when you open something new, Niri is worth your afternoon or night, depending on whether you are a day or night person.
If you liked horizontal scrolling but don't want to go with Niri window manager and Dank Linux together, you can consider two actively maintained projects like Scroll (a fork of Sway enabling horizontal scrolling) and PaperWM, the GNOME Shell extension I mentioned in the beginning.
Ever since it first appeared as a credit card-sized computer, the Raspberry Pi has quietly reshaped how we think about cheap, hackable hardware. Its ability to run fully-fledged Linux distros and GPIO pins for wiring up sensors and motors all while being cheap is what drew people in.
Of course, recent hikes across its lineup have made things harder for tinkerers, but that's the price they have to pay for access to a well-established ecosystem.
That ecosystem covers a lot of ground too. Between the standard boards, the Zero line, and the Compute Modules meant to sit inside custom carrier boards, there is a Pi suited for nearly every kind of project.
Makers and small companies have leaned on this range to build all sorts of things, and some of the results barely look like the underlying device anymore.
With this list, we will be taking a look at a few handhelds that will make you wonder what more a Raspberry Pi can do.
The List
Device
Price
Powered By
Status
Hackberry Pi CM5
$158 to $1,049
Raspberry Pi CM5
In Stock
PocketTerm35
$87.99 to $181.99
Raspberry Pi 4B / Pi 5
In Stock
Pi Slate
$299 to $749
Raspberry Pi 5
In Stock
uConsole
$249
Raspberry Pi CM4
Partial Stock
Cybert.
$199
Raspberry Pi CM5
Sold Out
SpecFive Strike
$434.99
Raspberry Pi CM4
Sold Out
1. Hackberry Pi CM5
The Hackberry Pi CM5 is an open source handheld built by Zitao, an engineering student at the Technical University of Dresden in Germany.
At the front sits a 4-inch 720x720 touchscreen, paired with a repurposed BlackBerry keyboard (Q10, Q20, or 9900 layouts), and the keys can be remapped through Vial if the default mapping does not suit you.
Powering it is a Raspberry Pi Compute Module 5, running on a quad-core Cortex-A76 chip clocked at 2.4GHz, and a 5000mAh battery keeps it running for roughly five hours on standby or three to four hours of active use.
There are two ways to get one. Elecrow sells a barebones kit for $158 to $168, but you will need to source your own Compute Module 5 and put it together yourself. If you want it ready to use, Carbon Computers sells a fully assembled version starting at $449, with prices climbing to $1,049 for higher RAM and storage.
You will notice further on that most handhelds on this list trade the standard Raspberry Pi board for a Compute Module to save space. The PocketTerm35 is Waveshare's pocketable Linux terminal, built around a full Raspberry Pi 4B or Pi 5.
It features a durable 3.5-inch 640x480 display and a 67-key silicone keyboard that can be used for code entry, command execution, and general editing. An RP2040 chip handles input, screen brightness, and volume control.
The device itself measures 93.5 x 168.5 x 37mm, with an aluminum faceplate on the front and a plastic cover on the back.
Prices on the Waveshare store start at $87.99 and go up to $181.99. The cheap end is the bare accessory kit, useful if you already have a spare Pi board to drop in. The higher end gets you a fully loaded setup with a Pi 4B or Pi 5, a 64GB card, and a 5000mAh battery.
The Pi Slate is Carbon Computers' take on a portable cybersecurity workstation, built around a Raspberry Pi 5 in a shell slim enough for daily carry. Two integrated antenna mounts sit at the top corners, so GPS, LoRa, or SDR radio modules can be bolted on without modifying the case.
The 5-inch touchscreen runs at 1920x720, and below it sits an RGB backlit keyboard with a gyroscopic cursor built in for pointer control. You get a 10,000 mAH battery as well, which is rated for 3 to 5 hours of use.
Carbon Computers sells the Pi Slate fully assembled, starting at $449 for the 2GB/32GB Pi 5 configuration, climbing to $749 for the 16GB/128GB version with more storage. A barebones kit without the Pi 5 goes for $299, and a separate radio kit with GPS, LoRa, and SDR support costs $149.
The uConsole does not lock you into one chip. ClockworkPi sells four interchangeable core modules for the same shell, and which one makes sense depends entirely on what you want to do with the thing.
The Raspberry Pi CM4 core is the ideal choice for daily use, coding, emulators, and anything that benefits from Raspberry Pi's software support. Complementing that, you get a 5-inch display running at 1280x720, with a 74-key backlit keyboard, a trackball that doubles as a mouse, and a D-pad with four buttons wired in for emulator controls.
An optional 4G LTE module adds cellular data, and the whole thing runs on replaceable 18650 Li-Ion batteries rather than a sealed battery pack. Plus, schematics and other design-related files can be found on GitHub.
Cybert. is yet another Carbon Computers offering; this one traces back to a concept called the MC01. Initially, it was built around the Raspberry Pi CM4, but later versions added support for the CM5 along with a custom QMK-compatible keyboard and a BlackBerry touch sensor for a cursor.
The handheld is now at v3.2, powered by a CM5, offering two additional USB 3.0 ports along with a standard M.2 SATA slot for adding things like an SSD, AI accelerator, LoRa, or a 4G LTE module.
For the display, it features a 4-inch 720x720 touchscreen and has wide Linux distro support, ranging from Raspberry Pi OS, Kali Linux, to other popular distros.
It is sold as a bare PCB and case, not a finished device, priced at $199 when in stock. You will need to source your own Compute Module, the display, a LiPo battery, and even a BlackBerry 9900 touch sensor separately to finish the build.
This handheld has a built-in SX1262 LoRa radio, letting you join Meshtastic mesh networks and talk to ATAK, the tactical mapping software used by military and first responder teams.
None of the other handhelds on this list have a radio like this built-in.
A Compute Module 4 sits inside, powering it all, with a 4.3-inch touchscreen and a QWERTY keyboard for tackling daily use, and GPIO, I2C, and SPI headers for anything else you want to wire up.
There are two editions on offer; the Base Edition ships without an SD card, and you have to manually install an operating system like Raspberry Pi OS, RetroPie, or emteria.OS, while the Ready Edition comes preloaded with Raspberry Pi OS and Meshtastic already configured.
At the time of writing, SpecFive only listed the Ready Edition of Strike for $434.99, though every color is currently sold out.
Firefox is my daily driver, my main browser. I have been using it for years and I also pay attention to the features it adds with new releases.
I find it surprising that many people use it just for browsing websites but not utilizing many other features it offers. Trust me, you will be surprised by just how much power and convenience is packed into this browser beyond simple web surfing.
From clever productivity hacks to handy built-in tools, it is packed with features that can help enhance your online experience. You don't need to visit third-party websites for several day-to-day tasks.
Let me share these "lesser known" (if I may call that) features of my favorite open source browser.
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In multiple places, I mention "add item to toolbar". Toolbar can be customized using Menu -> More Tools -> Customize Toolbar. Here, drag and drop items to the toolbar to add them.
Tab Split View
For a long time, the lack of a native split-screen viewing mode was a notable gap in Firefox's feature set. However, modern ultrawide monitor users can now view two tabs simultaneously side-by-side without needing to arrange separate OS windows.
While the feature is currently limited to splitting two tabs at once, rather than tiling multiple layouts, the implementation is clean and works exactly as intended.
To use it, simply hold CTRL key and click on the two tab titles you want to view together. Right-click either of the selected tabs, and choose Open in Split View from the context menu.
Once active, you can easily swap their positions or resize the dividing line to allocate more screen real estate to a specific page.
Split tab in Firefox
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Firefox-based Zen browser doesn an even more excellent at split tab views as it can have multiple tabs in multiple layouts.
PDF Viewer and Editor
Firefox offers more than just viewing PDF files. It allows annotating PDF documents with tools such as adding highlights, hand-drawings and texts. The browser also enables signing PDF documents and inserting images within PDF files.
Ensure that the last page of the current document is selected for appending. Once all PDFs are added, save the file to create a merged PDF without relying on external websites.
Merge PDF in Firefox
This capability makes Firefox an attractive option for managing and editing PDF documents, as it provides a convenient and accessible way to annotate, sign, and merge files.
I mostly use Firefox as the PDF viewer, because it can highlight and comment PDFs, that is accessible everywhere, like inside my Obsidian PDF viewer.
Built-in Color Picker
Web developers and designers frequently spot colors they want to capture while browsing. Having a color picker built directly into the browser eliminates the need for third-party extensions.
Firefox includes a native Eyedropper tool that allows you to easily pick colors from any webpage. To access it, open the main Firefox application menu, navigate to More Tools, and select Eyedropper.
Open Eyedropper from Menu
Once activated, your cursor transforms into a magnified circle with a precision pointer at the center, making it easy to isolate specific pixels. Simply hover over the exact color you want to capture and left-click. Firefox will instantly copy the corresponding hexadecimal color code directly to your clipboard.
Eyedropper in action
If you find yourself using this tool frequently and want to bypass the menus, you can add the Developer item directly to your main Toolbar.
Select Eyedropper from Developer Tool
This gives you one-click access to the Eyedropper whenever you need it.
Screenshot Tool
Firefox features a powerful, built-in screenshot tool that removes any need for separate screen-capture extensions or external utilities. To activate it, simply right-click on an empty space within any webpage and select Take Screenshot.
Click on Take Screenshot
One of the tool's best feature is its ability to intelligently align to individual DOM elements on a page. For instance, if you hover your cursor over an image, a specific text block, or a column, the tool automatically snaps its bounding box to perfectly capture that exact element.
Taking screenshot in Firefox
Click on the Download button to save that selection as a PNG file.
Beyond element snapping, the tool offers great flexibility:
Click and Drag to manually select a specific region of the page.
Save Visible button to capture exactly what is currently shown on your screen.
Save Full Page is the standout capability. It captures the entire webpage from top to bottom, even the portions buried far below the fold.
I absolutely loved the full website screenshot, which allow us to capture everything all the way to the very bottom of the page. This is best used when you enable Firefox's reading mode.
Whenever I find an important article, I usually take a full screenshot in reading mode and then annotate the important parts later! It is such a cool feature.
Text and Websites Translation
Newer versions of Firefox have the capability to translate website contents to your favorite language. While translations cannot always be top notch, as far as I read, those are decent and get the job done well enough.
It provides a considerable amount of languages to translate to and from, making it easy to parse international sites.
Translating an It's FOSS article from English to Spanish
Also, when you go to Menu -> More Tools -> Translate, you can translate specific words or sentences of your choice to other languages.
Custom Translations
This is incredibly handy when you don't need the whole page converted but just want to figure out a specific phrase.
Reading Mode
Firefox has a reading mode, which removes most of the distracting components and gives you a nice readable text. It really cleans up the page, stripping out messy blocks and sidebars so you can just focus on the content.
Article in Read Mode in Firefox
It takes this even further, too! You can adjust the font, the width of the text, and line spacing by using the Text and Layout settings right inside the reading mode.
Font and Layout settings in Firefox Read Mode
Also, you can set a different reading theme like Sepia, Dark, or Light depending on your environment and what's easiest on your eyes.
Theme settings in Firefox Read Mode
There is a read it aloud feature as well, which is useful when you want to listen to the article while multitasking.
When you are on articles that can be read in a reader mode, a reader mode button appears on the address bar adjacent to the URL of the article.
Click on it to enter the reading mode, and simply click on it again when you want to exit.
AI Summaries
AI summaries are helpful when you are in a hurry and want to know what an article is all about without reading the entire piece word for word.
AI Summary
Firefox now includes an AI button that allows you to quickly summarize contents and get AI help right inside your browsing workflow. A major advantage here is flexibility.
It lets you choose from and connect to multiple different AI service providers rather than locking you into a single model.
Select other AI providers
You can sign into your existing accounts with these chat services, which means you can seamlessly access your chat history and previous conversations while you work.
You can enable this feature in the General Settings under the Browser settings section. Once you toggle it on, it will take a few seconds for the initial setup.
AI related Settings
You will also see a noticeable increase in memory usage when it's running, which happens because a small model is executing entirely locally on your machine rather than sending your data to a cloud server.
Once it is up and running, you can simply left-click and hold on any link for a second to pull up a quick preview of the destination page along with its core keypoints.
Link Preview with Key points
If you want to tweak how these features behave, there is now a dedicated settings section specifically for AI-related configurations inside the main Firefox Settings menu.
Tab Group and AI
Firefox offers a powerful tab grouping feature to help you manage numerous open tabs efficiently.
You can manually create tab groups, for instance, by gathering all "It's FOSS" links into an "It's FOSS" group and assigning it a distinct color.
Manually group selected tabs
Even more interesting is the AI-powered tab grouping. If you have many tabs open and want to organize them quickly, Firefox's AI can assist with the heavy lifting.
To use this feature, right-click on any tab and select the "Add tab to a new group" option. Choose "Suggest more of my tabs".
Wait for the AI to analyze your open tabs. If related tabs are found, the AI will present a selectable list. You can then toggle which tabs to include in the group, provide a name for the group, and click "Done" to finalize it.
AI powered tab grouping
Picture in Picture Mode
Firefox makes it super easy to watch videos without getting distracted. Picture-in Picture (PiP) mode lets you shrink your video down to a little window that floats on top of everything else.
Watching video in Picture-in-Picture mode
To turn it on, head to the Firefox settings and look in the "General" section under "Browser". You'll find an option to enable PiP mode there.
Picture-in-Picture Mode Settings
You can also choose to automatically switch videos to PiP when you switch tabs. This is handy if you want to keep a video playing while you work on something else.
Switch to Picture-in-Picture mode on tab change
My personal favorite way to use PiP is during online courses; it keeps the video right there in my view while I code alongside searching documentation in tabs.
Vertical Sidebar
Firefox gives you the option to switch up your tab layout with a handy vertical sidebar.
To turn it on, just right-click anywhere on the tab bar and choose "Turn on vertical tabs".
Turn on Vertical Sidebar
Then, click the settings icon at the bottom of the sidebar. From there, you can customize it to expand and collapse when you hover your mouse over it.
Expand Sidebar on hover
I personally find this layout helps me keep track of a lot more tabs without feeling cramped. Plus, it looks pretty cool!
Quick Forget
To quickly erase browsing history of a short period, Firefox has a quick solution, Forget!
You can access this feature by clicking on the Forget toolbar item in your browser's toolbar. You have to add it first to the toolbar by customizing the toolbar.
From there, you have three options to choose from:
Forget the last 5 minutes: Removes your browsing activity from the past 5 minutes.
Forget the last 2 hours: Removes your browsing activity from the past 2 hours.
Forget the last 24 hours: Removes your browsing activity from the past 24 hours.
Quick Forget
Keep in mind that once you clear your history, it cannot be undone, and you will be logged out where ever you signed in.
Browsing History Dashboard
The Firefox View dashboard is like a personal history book for your browsing. It gives you more than just a simple list; it lets you see all your recent activity in detail!
Here's what you can do with it:
Get a clear view of every site you visited, including tabs from other devices.
Organize your history based on which sites you visit most often or those that are important to you.
Easily remove specific browsing history if you need to clean up your online activity.
Per site history in Firefox View
These are some of the cool features I use frequently, that make Firefox View a great way to keep your browsing organized and in control!
Multiple Profiles
Firefox natively supports using multiple profiles, which makes it incredibly easy to manage your home and work browsing in completely separate environments.
Profiles can be created by going to the main Menu and selecting Profiles -> New Profile. From there, you just give the profile a name, select a distinct color theme if you want to visually distinguish it, and click on Done Editing.
Profile Creation
Creating multiple profiles and switching between them is incredibly seamless with Firefox, allowing you to keep your cookies, history, and extensions completely isolated between your different workflows.
Switching Profiles
Task Manager
With the built-in task manager, you can easily view exactly which tab is consuming your memory, CPU, and other system resources. Being able to sort sites according to these metrics is incredibly useful.
Especially when you are running heavy AI tabs and video streams together and need to track down what's lagging your system.
Task Manager
To pull up the task manager instantly, you can use the keyboard shortcut Shift + Esc. It is also available via the main application menu if you prefer using your mouse.
Copy Link to Highlight
A feature that was absent for a long time, Firefox now supports link to highlights!
You can select a part of the text on a webpage, right-click on the selection, and select Copy Link to Highlight.
Open Link to Highlight
When you share this link with others, it will take them directly to that exact spot on the page and they can see the highlighted text instantly in the shared article!
It's incredibly convenient for pointing people straight to the most relevant information without making them scroll through a massive page.
Keyboard Based Controls
Did you know that there's more to the Firefox address bar than meets the eye? By pressing a few key combinations, you can access a set of powerful actions that can help you customize your browsing experience.
To get started, press CTRL+L to focus on the address bar. Next, enter > and press a space. You'll see that an Actions criteria is enabled.
This feature offers several useful actions, including Open a private window, Restart Firefox, etc.
To access these actions, simply use the keys as shown in the table below:
Key Combination
Use case
> space
Opens the Actions interface
^ space
History search
% space
Search among tabs
* space
Search among bookmarks
Using various keyboard actions
Built-in Game
Are you looking for a fun way to pass the time while waiting for your internet connection to kick in? You're not alone! Many browsers have hidden games that can keep you entertained.
Google Chrome has its popular Dino game, and Microsoft Edge has Surf. But what about Firefox?
The answer is yes, Firefox does have a game mode! But it's not as obvious as the others. To find it, follow these steps:
Go to Menu -> More Tools -> Customize Toolbar. Drag all the items in the bottom of the toolbar to the overflow section. What remains will be the Flexible spacer.
Play Game in Firefox
And that's when the magic happens! Click on the small game button in the bottom. The interface transforms into a ball game, where you can bounce the ball and have fun.
It may not be as flashy as some other games, but it's a cool way to pass the time while waiting for your internet connection to stabilize.
Experimental Settings
Now, let's see some experimental settings. Be cautious when using these, as these are either in experimental stage or cause unexpected issues.
Get a rounder corner
Firefox has an experimental feature that allows you to round off the corners of your browser, giving it a more cohesive look across all devices and operating systems, like GNOME desktop.
However, be cautious when using this feature, as it may cause unexpected issues or affect other parts of your system. To enable it, follow these steps:
Open Firefox and type about:config in the address bar. Press Enter to access the experimental settings page. You'll be warned that changing these settings can have serious implications. So proceed with caution!
About Config
In the search bar, enter rounded and find the setting called widget.gtk.rounded-bottom-corners.enabled. Toggle its value to true to enable rounded corners.
Set Rounded Corner
Now, go to Menu -> More Tools -> Customize Toolbar and disable the titlebar, as shown below.
Disable native titlebar
After making this change, close and restart Firefox.
Customize Keyboard Shortcuts
Want to take control of your browsing experience with custom keyboard shortcuts? Firefox allows you to do just that!
To get started, open Firefox and type about:keyboard in the address bar. This will bring up the experimental page for keyboard shortcut settings.
Change Keyboard Shortcuts
From here, you can alter key combinations for actions, remove existing keybindings and make any other changes you like.
Firefox Labs
Want to get a sneak peek at some cutting-edge features before they're widely released? Firefox has a section called "Firefox Labs" right in the settings menu.
Firefox Labs Settings
This is where you can experiment with experimental features that are still under development. Don't worry, your usage data isn't automatically shared just for trying these out. It only gets sent if you have technical and interaction data turned on in Privacy settings.
I'm currently running Firefox 151, and there are a few cool new features I can try.
Tab Notes seems really handy, but the List and Timer features are also pretty neat. They remind me of the homepage widgets in Vivaldi.
Wrapping Up
As you can see, Firefox is packed with a surprising number of features that go far beyond basic browsing, making your daily online tasks smoother and more efficient.
You don't need to go to Google Translate and copy paste text there. Simple right click works. Need quick screenshot, that' there. PDF reading and editing capabilities are additional blessings.
I can go on and on but I have to stop somewhere. So I stop here and I also let you explore lesser known features of DuckDuckGo search engine. I have a feeling that if you liked this article, you'll like that one too.
And don't forget to share your favorite Firefox feature in the comments below.
