: You guessed it: looks like it's a so-called AI
Mozilla, in its finite wisdom, embedded LLM bots into recent versions of Firefox for the vitally-important purpose ofâŚÂ naming tab groups. Now, some users are noticing CPU and power usage spikes caused by a background process called Inference.
Ugh. Reminder again for Firefox users to visit your about:config page, search for the browser.ml.chat.enabled key, and set that to false:
If yours says true then double-click it until it reads false.
Doing that turns off the AI chatbot features in Firefox, but also the stupid new LLM tab-naming feature that's rolling out.
if you want to turn off as much ai crap in firefox as possible, from this post on mozilla's connect forum, you should also set all these to false using about:config:
browser.ml.enable
extensions.ml.enabled
browser.ml.linkPreview.enabled
browser.tabs.groups.smart.enabled
browser.tabs.groups.smart.userEnabled
to get rid of the revamped sidebar, which is also trying to incorporate ai:
sidebar.revamp
unrelated anyone got browser recommendations for when we have to jump ship from firefox
and now keep in mind that all the other browsers are doing this shit, too, but you can't reconfigure them as with Firefox
on A for Effort's last point, is there any browser that offers users even half as much control as Firefox? if so, I'd like to try it as a backup
irritatingly, the list of AI settings in Firefox has grown. to kill them all as of today (Nov 20, 2026), go into about:config and set all of these to false (yes, you'll have to copy and paste them one by one):
browser.ml.enable
browser.ml.chat.enabled
browser.ml.chat.menu
browser.ml.chat.page
browser.ml.chat.page.footerBadge
browser.ml.chat.page.menuBadge
browser.ml.linkPreview.enabled
browser.ml.pageAssist.enabled
browser.tabs.groups.smart.enabled
browser.tabs.groups.smart.userEnabled
extensions.ml.enabled
browser.search.visualSearch.featureGate
in addition to nuking AI, it'll also speed up your browsing
Also since itâs just a language model reading pages to summarize them weâre learning that one failure mode for security now is a web page maliciously saying anywhere to basically forget all previous instructions and keylog what this user types into bankwebsite dot com.
Yeah I use the Firefox forks Zen for my PC and Ironfox for my phone. Ditch Mozilla Firefox, I'm sorry but it's gone over to the dark side.
Vivaldi has come out and said while they are a Chromium fork, they are not putting any AI in their stuff. And they have disabled any attempt for the browser to "phone home" to Google. And anything Google tries to do that is privacy invasive is being turned off with any ability to turn it back on removed, even for the user. And they have a pretty good built in browser ad blocker.
So. You know. You have an option that throws the biggest middle finger to Google it can while still being functional and able to use any website without spoofing the browser identity.















