Our Favorite Firefox Extensions
The following is a short list with some of our favorite extensions to the Firefox web browser. These are all optional, but we find them valuable in our everyday web browsing and web development tasks.
Jump to: [Must Have!] [User Picks] [Developer Picks]
Please note that all of the links below point to external web sites (mostly the official Mozilla Add-ons page) for the latest browser extension. We have no control over the content listed on those pages or the compatibility with your specific browser version.
We suggest that you Right Click (with the other mouse button) on these links and select Open link in new tab
for all of the choices you want to install from our list below. Using multiple tabs allows you to install all of these add-ons without using the back button on your Firefox web browser or leaving this page.
Must Have
- NoScript Security Suite
Selective and very customizable whitelist-based preemptive Javascript, Java, and Flash blocking tool to gain even more protection from the dangers of the public web. This can protect against virtually all known malware attacks against the Firefox web browser including cross-site scripting (XSS) and Click-Jacking. It also has a nice side effect of totally blocking those annoying Javascript advertisement pop-ups that get around the built-in Firefox pop-up blocker. An absolute must for anyone concerned about protection, security and privacy on the Internet. - AdBlock Plus
Annoyed by adverts? Troubled by tracking? Bothered by banners? Install Adblock Plus now to regain control of the Internet and change the way that you see the web. - Ghostery
Sadly an alarmingly high number of web sites are now actively trying to track your Internet activity across all web sites not just their own without your consent or control. This add-on returns control to you. Ghostery is a favorite for anyone wanting to put the brakes on unrestricted wholesale web tracking even if they do not yet see any of the negative effects.
User Picks
- Active Stop Button
Makes the stop button never inactive so you can click the browser stop button to halt annoying or distracting image animation. - Classic Theme Restorer
If you liked the way Firefox looked before version 29, code named Australis, this add-on lets you customize Firefox back to look the way you want. - CookieCuller
Extended cookie manager to protect/unprotect selected cookies outside of the internal cookie manager. - DownThemAll!
A powerful download manager built inside Firefox. This can potentially accelerate download speeds from most rate limited servers by 400% or more with full pause/resume/multi-part support. This makes it very easy to download all media (images, audio, video, etc.) from a web page with very little effort even when there are hundreds or thousands of files. - HTTPS Everywhere
Encrypt the Web by default with this extension that automatically encrypts connections to any web server supporting HTTPS. As always, even if you are at an HTTPS page, remember that unless Firefox displays a colored address bar and an unbroken lock icon in the bottom-right corner, the page is not completely encrypted and you may still be vulnerable to various forms of eavesdropping or hacking (in many cases, HTTPS Everywhere can not prevent this because sites incorporate insecure third-party content). - ErrorZilla Mod
Replaces the genericserver not found
text with lots of options including several popular web cache sites. - Fastest Search
This adds everything you wished the in-browser (Ctrl-F) search box could do. Search whole words, across tabs, titles, inside selected text block, and much more. You can use Find As You Type (FAYT) on all web site except the ones you choose, like webmail sites. Lots of options are available to completely customize everything to the way you work. - FEBE
Firefox Environment Backup Extension is much more than a tool to backup your Firefox settings. It can backup just about anything on your computer. - FireFTP
A free, secure, cross-platform FTP client that provides easy and intuitive access to FTP servers from a browser tab. This includes directory comparison, syncing directories while navigating, SSL encryption, file hashing and lots of other cool things. - HostIP.info Geolocation
Displays Geolocation (city, state, province, country) information for each web site you visit. Informed users are less likely to be tricked bylook-alike
web sites. For example if your banking web site is suddenly hosted in a different country, you can see that as a reason to call and verify. - Lightbeam
One of the most interesting and educational Firefox add-ons for anyone interested in finding out exactly how web tracking effects you personally. This exposes the third party web sites that track your browsing and makes it available in an easy to understand graphical way. - Linky
Allows many combinations of opening up to a hundred links in multiple tabs with two clicks. This is also useful for opening all of the image links on a page in one tab for faster browsing. - MultiFox
Now you can connect to web sites using different user accounts simultaneously! Now you can log into multiple Gmail accounts or multiple Facebook accounts at the same time. Each login is assigned a number shown on the address bar so it is easy to keep track. - NoSquint
Having a hard time reading something on the web? Is that website with the ridiculously small font and hot-pink-on-slightly-darker-hot-pink text raising your blood pressure? NoSquint gives you the power to fix that with custom colors, backgrounds or zoom levels that stick around even between visits. - Permit Cookies
Set cookie permissions for each site you view individually. Suggested usage: Disable cookies in Tools->Options->Privacy and only permit cookies from sites you trust. - ReloadEvery
Reloads web pages every so many seconds or minutes that you want. Very useful when waiting for web page content to change or forfree
services that require activity on their page for continued connectivity. - Self-Destructing Cookies
A tool to clean up unneeded cookies shortly after you close a tab. This lets you get the benefit of using cookies on sites that need them without having cookies stick around between visits. A whitelist is available for cookies you want to remain after the tab is closed. - Session Manager
Session Manager saves and restores the state of all tabs and windows - either when you want it or automatically at startup and after crashes. Additionally it allows you to reopen accidentally closed windows and tabs even days later. If you have lots of tabs open and are afraid of losing important tabs or windows while browsing this extension lets you relax. - ShowIP
Show the IP address of the current page in the status bar. It also allows querying custom services by IP (right mouse button) and Hostname (left mouse button), like WHOIS, netcraft. Additionally you can copy the IP address to the clipboard. - Stealther
If there are times you want to surf the web without leaving a trace in your local computer this is the right extension for you. It does more than the FirefoxPrivate Browsing
mode and even protects against different forms of web tracking. - Unhide Passwords
If you are not concerned about someone looking over your shoulder and seeing your web passwords as you type, why hassle with those obfuscated password fields where you never know if you typed your long password correctly or not? With this Firefox add-on password fields are still hidden with stars until you select them so you can easily spot and correct any mistakes as you type. - User Agent Switcher
Tricks web servers into thinking your Firefox is any other web browser you want. It is important to note that the ability to freely change the user agent (how the browser identifies itself to the web server) is something Microsoft™ Internet Explorer users do not have and could be one reason why web server operators mistakenly believe Internet Explorer still has a larger market share than it does. Virtually all other web browsers can appear to be Internet Explorer, but Internet Explorer can't appear to be anything else. Never believe market share statistics based only on user agent strings. - Xmarks Bookmark and Password Sync
If you use Firefox on multiple computers, this handy tool allows you to share the same open tabs, bookmarks and passwords between them all.
Developer Picks
- Codetch
Get the feel of Dreamweaver in a Firefox extension. Edit your documents right next to your web pages as you surf. - Fangs Screen Reader Emulator
Creates a textual representation of a web page similar to how the page would be read by a modern screen reader. This is required for creating web sites and content that meet national and international standards for accessibility. This also gives sighted people a glimpse into the web from the blind perspective. Note that all web search engines are effectivelyblind users
of your web site. If your web site is confusing or useless when viewed with this add-on, Google and all of the other search engines will also have problems. - Firebug
Firebug integrates with Firefox to put a wealth of development and debugging tools at your fingertips while you browse. You can edit, debug, and monitor CSS, HTML, and JavaScript live in any web page. Its ability to quickly locate and point out errors is amazingly valuable to make your development time much more productive. - HTML Validator
Adds local HTML validation to the Firefox status bar and extends the View Page Source to include suggestions. The validation is done completely local inside Firefox by Tidy from W3C without sending anything to the Internet. Every user should get this just to see how well your favorite web sites follow the published standards. Every web developer that creates a web page without this tool is doing things the hard way. - iMacros
A wonderful tool to automate almost anything you can do in Firefox. Record and replay all of your repetitious work. This can be anything from testing web navigation across any number of pages and web sites to filling out forms including remembering passwords. Perfect for web developers wanting functional, performance, and regression testing of web applications. The built-in STOPWATCH command captures precise web page response times. iMacros also includes support for many AJAX elements. - LinkChecker
Check the validity of links on any web page with color coded highlights that quickly show both good and broken links. This is wonderful for site maintenance when a large number of external links are used. - Screengrab!
Convert all or part of a web page into a graphicscreen capture
image even if you can't see the whole page on one screen. This is fast and very useful for documentation work and is a green way toprint
web page receipts. - Server Spy
Shows what brand and version (if available) of HTTP server software runs on the sites you visit. This information is also useful for detecting fake copies of web sites like if Microsoft suddenly was hosted on Apache or Google was hosted on anything other than GWS. - TamperData
Use TamperData to view and modify HTTP/HTTPS headers, trace and time HTTP response/requests and security test web applications by modifying form POST parameters. This is a must-have for all developers working on data collection and shopping web sites. - Web Developer
A valuable collection of tools for technical control of any web page including the ability to suspend CSS, view all hidden or password form field contents and quickly disable/enable just about anything that makes testing web sites easier.
Please contact us if you think your favorite Firefox extension should be included on our list.
First published 2006-12-31. The last major review or update of this information was on 2015-04-09. Your feedback using the form below helps us correct errors and omissions on this page.