Mozilla Firefox Mobile review

These, however, are all mere niceties. Firefox Mobile's most interesting feature centers not around usability, but the ability to add extensions. These "Add-ons" can be downloaded directly from the browser itself by searching from the Add-ons options page. The number available isn't stunning right now – we counted a mere 65 on the Mobile Add-ons for Firefox website, but that includes Weave Sync, for example, an add-on that keeps bookmarks, tabs, history and passwords synchronised between your mobile device and your computer. Plus, with a similar development framework to desktop extension, that number is likely to grow rapidly.

But, there are problems. The first is its initial load time, which at seven seconds is sluggish. The standard Maemo browser loads in under one second. We're not keen on the way you zoom either. Instead of the infinitely adjustable method offered by the standard browser, you simply double tap to zoom directly to an image or column – an approach that feels restrictive.

Despite good performance figures in our tests – the browser loaded the BBC homepage in a slick nine seconds, just a second behind the standard browser and Mobile Safari on the iPhone 3GS – it simply doesn't feel as snappy as the figures would suggest. Panning around pages stutters more, blank areas appear as the areas of the page are slowly redrawn; it simply doesn't feel as responsive as it ought to.

There's also no universal Flash support as yet: you can download the experimental Flash plugin, but Mozilla clearly isn’t confident about its performance or stability, which is disappointing. YouTube addicts can, however, enable embedded YouTube video through an add-on.

Firefox Mobile shows promise, with a slick user interface and extension support – something no other mobile browser can offer. But issues such as sluggish-feeling performance, awkward zoom controls and lack of official Flash support make it feel like a work in progress rather than a finished product. Let's hope that, by the time it makes its way onto Android later this year, the niggles have been ironed out.

Author: Jonathan Bray