Like Wikipedia: Firefox brings link preview for the whole web

New AI functions for Firefox: Mozilla is equipping its web browser with many AI assistants, which are particularly impressive in terms of data protection. In the future, these assistants will be available for link previews, tab groups, translations and alt texts. Mozilla emphasizes that the AI models run exclusively on the user's device and that sensitive information should always remain local.

Page preview like Wikipedia

The link preview shows the user a summary of a hyperlink. To achieve this, the user must hold down Shift (⇧) and Alt or Option (⌥) while hovering over a link with the mouse pointer. The browser then generates a card showing the title, description, and an image; the AI adds three dots as an overview of the content. The function is similar to Wikipedia's page previews, which can be activated simply by hovering over them. However, Firefox will be able to generate such a preview for any link in the future.

The link preview is currently still experimental and part of Firefox Labs. Accordingly, the features are not yet set in stone: For example, the generated map is currently explicitly not part of the website, it floats above the browser window. However, the developers can also imagine integrating the map as a fixed part of the website so that it is retained when scrolling. Users should already indicate their preference. Whether a different key combination or none at all triggers the link preview has not yet been finalized – but the call should not collide with common keyboard shortcuts.

Technically, the link preview works as follows: Firefox loads the HTML of the requested website without transmitting the user's login information (credentialless). The browser does not open the page and does not execute any scripts –. However, Firefox transmits a special x-firefox-ai header so that website owners can decide what content they want to make available. The title, description, and image of the map are taken from the website's metadata, for example Open Graph Data for social networks. For the actual content, Firefox calls up the read view to obtain the main article and its length.

On the AI side, wllama is used with SmolLM2-360M from HuggingFace; in current tests, the AI generates the first point of the summary within four seconds and adds another point every second. The browser must download the AI model the first time the link preview is activated. In addition to performance optimizations, Mozilla is currently working on supporting languages other than English. Further details on the new function can be found in the developers' blog.

Automatic AI tab groups

There is another AI update for the tab groups that Firefox only introduced at the end of April 2025. If users create a new group by dragging and dropping a tab onto another or adding it by right-clicking, the assistant automatically suggests a suitable name. This is done based on the titles and descriptions of the tabs. The AI also searches the open tabs for other suitable websites so that the user can add them directly to the group's suggestions. This function is also currently still experimental.

Mozilla is also continuing to work on two AI features that have already been introduced: The translations happen completely locally and can transfer entire websites or individual passages from one language to another. This is still a beta version. Firefox automatically generates alt texts in PDFs – The PDF editor suggests suitable descriptions when users insert images into their documents. However, the developers emphasize that the user should always check the alt text. Even with this function, all data remains local.

Mozilla has been working intensively on AI integration in Firefox since June 2024. Users should be able to choose for themselves which provider – they prefer for chatbots – for example. The developers had already emphasized during the initial announcement that they wanted to take their time and constantly gather feedback from users. As all the features now presented are still experimental, this expectation was justified.

(fo)