I've been on Firefox since I can remember it being out, but the latest versions, 56+, have me using it only intermittently due to battery drain issues on Mac[0] :(. I am really hoping they get this fixed shortly.
Which brings me to my other point (which I always keep hammering on in browser threads): why don't 3rd-party browser focus more on battery? If you're on Windows, Edge is king in battery use. On macOS, its Safari. On Linux, none (but then Linux doesn't have good power management in general). We live in a mobile-first world these days, why not focus browser development there?
Edit: I'm not dissing the Firefox or Chrome team their efforts, but almost all the news articles or blogs I see speak about Chrome or Firefox getting faster. And they do, by significant jumps. But when there are battery improvements, they are usually pretty middling (say 10-20m more battery life). So all I'm saying: why not flip the focus?
There are reasonable answers -- Safari's extensions aren't quite as capable as the other two, so it's possible you're relying on an extension that Safari doesn't have and can never duplicate, and of course if you need to sync bookmarks and other browser data across OS platforms, Safari falls down in the way all iCloud-backed apps do. But Safari does focus a lot on battery conservation, and if you're on a laptop that can make a big difference. And, while I'm sure there are benchmarks out there to quibble over, in practice Safari seems to be just as fast and just as compliant as Chrome and Firefox are.
I've been using Safari as my main web browser for years without feeling like I'm missing out on either performance or killer features. I keep copies of Firefox and Chrome around and keep them up to date, mostly for web site testing purposes; neither of them have added features compelling enough to make me want to switch back. I doubt Firefox 57 is likely to change that equation, although I'm happy to hear that they've got their groove back, as it were.
I love Firefox, and owning an iMac I'm not terribly concerned about the power efficiency difference between the two - but damn if it isn't convenient to have the ability to just pick up where I left off.
I don't have a laptop, but will when the Qualcomm Snapdragon Windows10 machines land, and will probably use Edge exclusively there.
It's important to watch where incentives run. Google has the incentive to profit from you. Microsoft and Apple have the incentive to make sure your browser and device work as efficiently and well together as possible. Mozilla focuses on privacy as their main feature.
They keep making it more and more like Chrome. If I wanted to use Chrome, I would. It's gotten to bloat maximum.
It's slow as hell. It's less flexible and less easy to personalize. They have broken some of my favorite add-ons.
This piece is pure propaganda.
It does break some extensions, but many have converted. Which are you having trouble with? The main one I'm missing is "Disable Ctrl+Q".
My notes: https://www.bidon.ca/fr/random/2017-10-05-webextensions-supp...
My main objection is still the sheer size and the amount of memory it takes, and the continual feature creep to make it more and more like Chrome. I know I'm in the minority, and also that it's heresy to say anything bad about Mozilla here. Oh well.
I only wish I had lots of money and/or time so I could help revive the development of xombrero, but at least it's still available.
Other options for Vim-like web extensions are Saka key, Vim-Vixen and Tridactyl.
The regular Firefox is much slower than Chrome still. The nightly is now noticeably faster than Chrome.
The current stable release 56 just can't compare to chrome.
Apparently they have decided 57 is stable already but plan to make it official tomorrow.
From my unscientific testing, 57 is only as fast as chrome, while the nightly (59) seems to be faster than chrome. They should have waited until 59 was stable.
I would be using the nightly as my main browser if I didn't have experience with crashes and bugs with nightly versions before.