Pale Moon 32.1.0 launches with major web compatibility improvements
The developers of the open source web browser Pale Moon have released version 32.1.0. The new version is a significant release for the project, as it improves web compatibility by enabling Google WebComponents support.
Pale Moon shares code with the Firefox web browser, but it is a standalone project. One of the main changes is that Pale Moon is now also available for Intel-based and Arm-based macOS devices. Previously, Pale Moon was available as a Beta release for macOS. Now, Pale Moon has exited beta and is "considered stable" by the developers. The browser is also available for Windows, Linux and Android.
Pale Moon users may select Pale Moon Menu > Help > Check for Updates to run a manual check for updates. The new version should be detected by the update check and installed to the system. There is also Menu > Help > About Pale Moon, which displays the current version of the web browser.
Pale Moon 32.1.0
Pale Moon 32.1.0 is a major update for the web browser. One of the main improvements that it introduces is support for Google WebComponents. Previous versions did support the feature, but it was turned off as development was still ongoing.
The implementation reached a stage that it can be enabled for all users by default, according to the release notes. The developers note, that the implementation is not complete and that more work is necessary. Most websites that use the technologies should work, but there may be unexpected combability issues on some websites. Future versions of the Pale Moon web browser will improve compatibility further.
Pale Moon's changelog lists several other changes. Here is a quick overview of important ones:
- Addressed security issues in the web browser and implemented Defense in Depth protections.
- Filename safety improved when saving files to prevent potential environment leaks.
- Web text-to-speech API is now enabled by default.
- Removed several site-specific overrides as they are no longer required.
- Tab titles fade instead of using ellipses if they are too long. This gives them a bit more space in the tab.
- Fixed VP8 video playback issues.
- Fixed "several crashes related to regular expression code".
You can check out the full release notes here.
I was a user from the first version when Pale Moon was released, but I moved to Brave from the beginning of Brave’s development, and even tried Vivaldi. for that reason completely forgot about Pale Moon.
In the past, I was interested in the milestone version Pale Moon v29 and tried it, but I gave up on continuing to use it because of the fatal inconvenience of web compatibility (cannot connect to important sites such as public sites and financial institutions). so never looked back.
However, recently on ghacks.net, I learned about the milestone version Pale Moon 32.2.0 (64-bit), which piqued my interest and decided to give it a try.
Certainly, as written in the comment section, I realized that “remarkable evolution has been achieved”.
It’s surprisingly quick, open browser super fast (instantaneous) and responsive (less than a second). Very few system resources (RAM, CPU) , less than half as High efficiency (energy saving) compared to modern browsers. Plus, web compatibility isn’t bad.
The extensions I added are the following 3 items:
uBlock Origin
https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock-for-firefox-legacy
Dark Moon
Swarth: Modifies web pages to use a dark color scheme or based on the user’s preferences.
I was satisfied with the ease of use, so I imported bookmarks and adjusted the Preferences.
The UI and UX are modern enough and nice enough to keep up with modern browsers.
It’s still in the testing phase, but it feels better than the Brave that I use occasionally.
It feels amazing and I will continue to use it for a while.
Well, it’s no surprise that there are quite a few people who are attached to Pale Moon.
Although I added uBlock Origin to Pale Moon, but the Maintainer Ukrainian Last Missing Jul 20, 2021 (probably due to the war with Russia), and that filters has not been updated since.
https://github.com/gorhill/uBlock-for-firefox-legacy/releases
uBlock0_1.16.4.30.firefox-legacy.xpi
So I added eMatrix (Fork of uMatrix,) .
https://gitlab.com/vannilla/ematrix
Version 5.0.3
Updated on March 1, 2023
Additionally, the extension I added:
CookiePage
MozArchiver
Number Tabs
It’s amazing in a way.
Fading Firefox, the tearful passion of its fundamentalists…
At best, please have mercy on a broken toy. Ahahaha
It’s a extremely offensive insult!
I’m not a Pale Moon user, but I can’t stand such “abusive language”.
It’s also surprising that ghacks.net would tolerate comments like this.
Freedom of speech is moral freedom, not freedom to insult others.
Isn’t it like a “lawless zone”?
At some point, it seems the ruffians have have gone down to strutting ghacks.
Comments that are only profane and insulting to others should be moderated.
Much more webcompatibility is coming soon, next is:
– Dynamic Module import,
– JS: Support class field syntax
– Implement logical assignment operators
3 more ECMAScript features which have been missing and rendered many pages “dead on arrival”
It is impressive that all that stuff is actually being able to successfully implement.
Many thanks to Martok, FranklinDM and dbsoft – which are right now making Pale Moon/UXP more useful again. Which means, when i am using Desktop machines again from time to time, that i will also use Pale Moon a bit more instead of my main Microsoft Edge.
Can’t get behind a junk browser whose few proponents use toxic, inflammatory and outdated slurs while defending it.
Yeah yesterday Moonbat was referring to “moron XP users”, and Basilisk-Dev deleted his post for being inflammatory. Nice to see that jerk get what’s coming. But he’s only one of many there who are like this.
Longtime Pale Moon user here. Finally decided to try a new version after being stuck on v29 for the longest time. I made a full profile backup first just in case.
I can say it seems that none of my old classic addons were disabled or deleted and they seem to be working so far. Overall performance is much better and feels snappy again where on v29 it would often hang or lag. It also fixed some website functionality like github’s asset list would not load anymore. Youtube is still slow-ish but much much better. Before, I switched to a redirect script to an invidious instance but that didn’t run too well either. I’m switching back to Youtube proper now.
Three negatives so far.
1) even bigger memory usage (1200MB -> 1500MB @766 tabs, tabs are suspended to save RAM haha… I miss 400MB RAM usage from 10 years ago, or even 800MB ~5 years ago…)
2) random CPU spikes (just now 30% despite PM not doing anything)
3) PM closed itself 1x so far (tested Twitter instead of Nitter and while scrolling through a timeline PM closed)
I’ll continue using 32.1.0 for now. Should crashes happen more often I’ll try to figure out what website or addon causes it, or maybe it’s the new WebComponents? In the worst case I go back to v29. But anyway, so far good job making Pale Moon snappier.
PS: I know that 766 tabs is a lot but it’s too late to manage them :(
@whatever, 766 tabs is like asking for trouble. You can save them to a separate bookmarks folder and easily manage them from there.
766 tabs. Just simply incredible.
who the paradigm is still using this wolf dump coded piece of sh!tware???
Are you Turbin ?
It’s nice to see such forward momentum with Pale Moon but it’s also equally disappointing to see that so many old extensions never got updated (expected) and that there is so little new ones.
A point of fact is that uBlock Origin legacy is at a state of limbo right now because JustOff has gone AWOL as he was the repo owner entrusted by Raymond to handle the extension more than that JustOff was a great force behind Pale Moon’s extensions but since his departure it has all stalled as far as I have seen. JustOff is from Ukraine I believe so he has other problems to deal with right now but he did vanish well before the conflicts so I hope he is well.
Many of the old extensions no longer work or have conflicts these days so its not really a browser I can get behind at this point. I wish I had taken the time to learn how to write, port and modify/fix extensions. If I did I would probably fix a few and try to port a few to make them work well on modern firefox and waterfox classic/palemoon.
I miss the days when you just downloaded firefox or a fork and everything was all in one place and just worked. You could get everything done without all the fuss of today without so much sacrifice. There are way too many options today that all lead to sacrifice. Chromium is no better either.
uBlock legacy works fine, just because Chrome introduced the retarded idea of constantly updating and breaking things doesn’t mean you have to have constant updates of everything every fortnight. Pale Moon’s extension system and Javascript support is quite stable; there is no need to update an extension once published unless one is adding new features to it.
//Many of the old extensions no longer work
You’ve been to the browser’s own addons site, right? Or do you expect long since abandoned Firefox extensions to magically run perfectly, forever? Several of the popular ones have been forked for this browser already, or the original authors of the Firefox extensions have even stepped up to make them compatible with Pale Moon.
Hi REX and thanks for replying to my comment.
Whilst uBlock Legacy may work fine now what happens in the future since nobody is maintaining it or developing it any further or if Raymond adds some new and useful feature, are we just expected to ignore that? Security is a constant evolving world and often times things need to be improved.
I have absolutely no doubt about that. I loved the extension system of old so you of not need to convince me of that. I don’t understand… if there is no need to update an extension once it is published then why are so many old ones broken and even by your own admittance long abandoned Firefox extensions won’t magically run perfectly, forever.
I can count maybe 300 extensions and I wouldn’t say that many of the popular ones have been forked over and many of the original authors have left.
Perhaps it could be an issue with the portable version that I am using but several old firefox extensions did not function well or at all. I was not able to get the options up for Imagus which was a popular extension and that is not ported over at all. Mouseover Popup Image Viewer is not as good as Imagus as I have compared and used the two for years.
Greasemonkey is wildly outdated and some userscripts (‘Bypass All Shortlinks’ for one) have issues working with it and the fork is no better either as that has been abandoned long ago also.
Some of the ports are not as good as the original version either. Don’t get my wrong I have always stuck up for Pale Moon and what they have been doing but it just has no lured many new extension developers and even established extension developers refuse to port their extension to Pale Moon which sucks.
A popular extension such as Sponsorblock is notably absent as is I still don’t care about cookies, bypass paywalls clean, Enhancer for youtube, LocalCDN, Skip Redirect, FastForward, Windowed – floating Youtube/every website, Unhook,
A new port and update of lazarus, Tiletabs, (this one has caused me some odd bugs) basically anything decent like add to searchbar, context x, would be nice to keep them going so they do not fall by the wayside or even to see them improve if possible.
There are some extensions like Decentraleyes (in pale moon’s example) that need updates from time to time but as of the time writing it has not received one since April 19, 2021.
I’m honestly only scratching the surface. Do not get me wrong there is a lot that Pale Moon does right and believe they make me smile when I reconnect with my past and the power firefox once had but there definitely need to be a bigger push and a huge initiative needs to happen for extensions. Like I said, I wish I was capable and able to do such things but I cannot as I truly feel like Pale Moon does have a superior extension system to say the least.
I will keep testing it as my memory catches up to the browser and I recall all the cool things and extensions I would once use and see how it goes and if it will once again fit my wants and needs.
FF ESR is stabler for addons than the normal flavour.
Hi all, I have been using Pale Moon since its beginning. Other browsers too, of course, but PM is my favorite. It has great extensions and is compatible with everything i use. This latest version 32.1.0 seems to have smoothed it out even more. You can easily get the fonts and sizes of everything to your needs. The portable versions are great and i use them most of the time off flash drives. Nice browser.
Is this a paid post?
Probably. I have been using palemoon for years, and i am about to drop it.
While the latest compability updates helped a bit, it doesn’t change the fact the browser performs like crap.
I have a quad core laptop and it only uses 1 cpu core, it’s slow as hell. Many websites make the entire browser slow as a turtle or just unusable. But when i try to load those on firefox esr, they load perfectly fine and fast.
Browsing mainstream sites like google, ebay, twitter, rumble, youtube, facebook, etc is a total pain, a infuriating experience.
Even duckduckgo, it’s default search engine, has started to perform badly recently.
Not too much compatibilty imho.
looks like firefox
Before firefox was destroyed
The Android version has been discontinued a long time ago now, please correct your article.
Does Pale Moon support Web Extension addons?
@TelV, No. Never has, never will. This has always been the case and it’s completely irrelevant to Web Components, related with this release.
https://forum.palemoon.org/viewtopic.php?f=65&t=22399 (search for: WebExtensions)
@ Job Batista / George,
I like Pale Moon, but have a vision problem on sites that use pale grey fonts. On FF / Floorp, Text Legibility does the job very well to turn the colour to black, but it’s primarily a WebEx flavor and too frustrating to use Pale Moon without it. Here’s the link to addon:
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/text-legibility/
@ TelV: Try NoSquint. You can adjust similar settings per website (or globally) with it. Lots of quality extensions in the Pale Moon Add-ons site.
https://addons.palemoon.org/addon/nosquint/
No. It’s not in the roadmap.
Be sure to enter about:config and:
Important update: When using this beta with webcomponents enabled, go into about:config and set dom.getRootNode.enabled to true for the intended functionality. It should have been flipped before this beta was built but slipped my mind.
Also set dom.enable_performance_observer to true to get maxium web compatibility.
And check this tutorial to use MPV to play videos: https://forum.palemoon.org/viewtopic.php?f=19&t=29572
@upp: There is no beta, this is about the 32.1.0 stable release. dom.getRootNode.enabled is already set to true anyway.
@everyone: Don’t mess with about:config unless you know what you are doing.