Mozilla Might Soon Offer a Subscription Service for Firefox

Mozilla could be rethinking the way it offers some features on Firefox. The company is rethinking its business to generate more revenue and introduce new sources of revenue for the business, and one of them could involve offering a subscription service on Firefox.

Mozilla’s CEO Chris Beard said in an interview with German media outlet T3N that the company is exploring the idea of introducing a new subscription service to Firefox. The service will offer premium tiers to some built-in features on the browser, like offering more bandwidth for the built-in VPN or even offering secure cloud storage built-in to the browser.

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Details about the new subscription service is unknown, and Mozilla isn’t revealing the pricing details yet. The company plans to launch the new service by Fall, around October.

But here’s the best part: all the features that are currently on Firefox won’t change. That means Mozilla will continue to offer the same features as part of Firefox, and only introduce new premium tiers that users can access with the new subscription, without affecting the existing, free users of the browser.

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Conversation 19 comments

  • Rares Macovei

    11 June, 2019 - 3:43 am

    <p>No one is going to pay a subscription for a browser. Lmao. This will burn in flames.</p>

    • StevenLayton

      11 June, 2019 - 3:52 am

      <blockquote><a href="#434543"><em>In reply to Cryio:</em></a><em> I think the point is that you're not paying a subscription for the basic browser, but rather for optional additional functionality built into the browser which you might otherwise pay extra for through 3rd party products.</em></blockquote><p><br></p>

    • wright_is

      Premium Member
      11 June, 2019 - 3:58 am

      <blockquote><em><a href="#434543">In reply to Cryio:</a></em></blockquote><p>You aren't paying a subscription for the browser. You are paying for additional services running through the browser. </p><p>For example, instead of using paid for Dropbox storage, you could use the Firefox equivalent or if you use VPN, you could pay for higher bandwidth through the built-in one, which gives a free tier in co-operation with Proton Mail.</p><p>Given they are alienating their primary sponsor (Google), by reducing the amount of information that Google can scrape from Firefox users, I would guess that their stipend from Google will gradually shrink over the coming years.</p>

      • hellcatm

        11 June, 2019 - 6:35 am

        <blockquote><em><a href="#434548">In reply to wright_is:</a></em></blockquote><p>This is interesting but the VPN would only be through Firefox so if you want a VPN for other programs (If you use more than one browser for instance) you'd still have to go with an external VPN. Also their storage service would be a secondary one for a lot of people as well. I use Onedrive, I wouldn't want to just use the Firefox storage. Unless they make both the VPN and storage use for your whole system, but are people going to be willing to trust Firefox (not that they'll steal info, but security and reliability). </p>

        • wright_is

          Premium Member
          11 June, 2019 - 7:21 am

          <blockquote><em><a href="#434559">In reply to HellcatM:</a></em></blockquote><p>For many, the VPN through the browser would be all they want. But I agree, I don't see the benefits of the options mentioned so far. But it was more to counter Cryio, that you don't pay for the browser, but (optionally) for services on top.</p>

  • jchampeau

    Premium Member
    11 June, 2019 - 8:40 am

    <p>Taking a browser that gets less than 10% <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Usage_share_of_web_browsers&quot; target="_blank">usage share</a> on desktop and less than 1% on mobile, and asking its users to pay for some add-ons they can only use through it, doesn't seem like a good strategy to me.</p>

    • OwenM

      Premium Member
      12 June, 2019 - 12:38 am

      <blockquote><a href="#434582"><em>In reply to jchampeau:</em></a></blockquote><p>I don't disagree with you, but Mozilla can't really ignore this problem either</p>

  • skane2600

    11 June, 2019 - 10:36 am

    <p>IMO Mozilla lives on borrowed time. It's original appeal was to people who hated Microsoft and IE. As Microsoft's dominance has waned and IE has become mostly irrelevant, that initial appeal has faded. They never had a viable business model.</p>

    • wright_is

      Premium Member
      12 June, 2019 - 12:33 am

      <blockquote><em><a href="#434626">In reply to skane2600:</a></em></blockquote><p>Only to be replaced by Google's Chrome, which is even more of a problem than IE ever was.</p>

    • Rickard Eriksson

      12 June, 2019 - 2:43 am

      <blockquote><em><a href="#434626">In reply to skane2600:</a></em></blockquote><p>Firefox will stay as long as browsers like chrome cant even get their UI to show more then 10 tabs at a time. </p><p><br></p><p>And even if firefox went away i would still use vivaldi before chrome or ie. </p>

      • skane2600

        12 June, 2019 - 3:34 am

        <blockquote><em><a href="#434795">In reply to Rickard Eriksson:</a></em></blockquote><p>I have 20 tabs open in Chrome right now on my middling desktop PC. </p>

  • skane2600

    11 June, 2019 - 10:40 am

    <p> Opera includes a basic VPN for free.</p>

    • wright_is

      Premium Member
      12 June, 2019 - 12:34 am

      <blockquote><em><a href="#434628">In reply to skane2600:</a></em></blockquote><p>So does Firefox, in cooperation with Proton Mail. The payment would be for more bandwidth.</p>

  • waethorn

    11 June, 2019 - 10:56 am

    <p>The VPN would only be worthwhile if the following are true:</p><p><br></p><p>1) It's fast.</p><p>2) They don't log anything.</p><p>3) It isn't complicit with the "many-eyes" state-sanctioned data collection. (this one is tricky if not impossible to implement realistically – see thatoneprivacysite.net )</p><p>4) It works with Netflix and other VPN-averse services, otherwise people will just complain about it breaking stuff. (NordVPN works fine with Netflix, but has restrictions on geolocation)</p>

    • skane2600

      11 June, 2019 - 1:27 pm

      <blockquote><em><a href="#434631">In reply to Waethorn:</a></em></blockquote><p>I disagree with their "Jurisdiction" ratings. If a VPN service doesn't keep any logs where they are located isn't a privacy concern. On the other hand if they do keep logs, being in a "friendly" jurisdiction doesn't make them any less of a privacy risk. </p>

    • wright_is

      Premium Member
      12 June, 2019 - 12:35 am

      <blockquote><em><a href="#434631">In reply to Waethorn:</a></em></blockquote><p>If it is based off the free, limited service they offer with Proton Mail, it is run through/managed in Switzerland.</p>

  • Lordbaal

    11 June, 2019 - 11:53 am

    <p>They will lose users that way.</p>

  • Jollytiki

    Premium Member
    11 June, 2019 - 12:52 pm

    <p>I personally would pay for the extra if it was worth it. I am trying to get away from all Google all the time. Between a Chromebook, Android Phone, and a PC..I like to change it up a bit on my PC and Firefox is my browser of choice.</p><p><br></p><p><br></p>

  • red.radar

    Premium Member
    11 June, 2019 - 3:36 pm

    <p>I could be open to paying for some features. Right now I don't see how they sustain themselves if they are living off add revenue from the default search selection. Especially if they are making the strategic choice to be a "privacy" focused browser. </p><p><br></p><p>If they can make a real high quality product with some killer features I would be open to paying for the browser. However, they would be trying to bring a business model back from the dead. No one has paid for a browser since Netscape…. </p><p><br></p><p>Little concerned here…. As the market share drops for Mozilla what happens if the search company that funds them decides to not renew the deal? I see sustainability concerns for Mozilla. </p>

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