Firefox for windows 7

Firefox is the fast, lightweight, privacy-focused browser that works across all your devices.

Firefox 115 is the last version to support Windows 7. This repository includes patches that enable Firefox to run on Windows 7 beyond the official end-of-support date, allowing users to continue using the latest features and improvements from Firefox.

Platform Support

Windows 7, 8, 10, 11.

FAQ

1. The minimize/maximize/close buttons get hidden with lightweight theme with hardware acceleration enabled

   This is a bug that I currently cannot resolve. However, you can work around it by following step:

   • In about:config toggle media.hardware-video-decoding.enabled to false, toggle gfx.webrender.software to true

2. How to change language?

   • Download language packs from here.
   • In about:config toggle extensions.langpacks.signatures.required to false, toggle xpinstall.signatures.required to false, toggle intl.multilingual.downloadEnabled to true, toggle intl.multilingual.enabled to true
   • Open the langpack for target locale (eg firefox-136.0a1.en-CA.langpack.xpi if you want an en-CA locale).
   • In about:preferences click "Set Alternatives" under "Language", move desired locale to the top position, click OK, click "Apply And Restart"

Building

1. Bootstrap a copy of the Firefox source code

   git clone https://github.com/mozilla/gecko-dev.git

   This repository contains patches for specific versions of Firefox, stored in directories named <DATE>.<commit_id>. Here, commit_id is the commit ID of Firefox, and DATE is purely for File Explorer.

   cd gecko-dev
   git checkout <commit_id>
   ./mach bootstrap

2. Building Rust on Windows MSVC

   To ensure that rustc always generates programs compatible with Windows 7, Rust needs to be patched. This repository contains files named Rust<rust_version>win7.diff for this purpose, where rust_version is the version of Rust used to build Firefox, as specified here.

   • Clone the source with git

     git clone https://github.com/rust-lang/rust.git
     cd rust
     git checkout <rust_version>

   • Apply patch

     git apply --verbose --ignore-space-change Rust<rust_version>win7.diff

   • Build

     python x.py build --target i686-pc-windows-msvc,x86_64-pc-windows-msvc
     python x.py build library --target i686-pc-windows-msvc,x86_64-pc-windows-msvc

3. Compiling Cargo from Source

   • Clone the source with git

     git clone https://github.com/rust-lang/cargo.git
     cd cargo

   • With cargo already installed by ./mach bootstrap, you can simply run:

     cargo build --release

4. Apply patches

   Navigate to the <DATE>.<commit_id> directory, modify the REPO_PATH variable in apply_patches.bat to the path of the Firefox source, and then double-click it to apply the patches.

5. Build Firefox

   • Add our custom-built rustc.exe and cargo.exe to your PATH, delete or rename %USERPROFILE%\.rustup and %USERPROFILE%\.cargo, and remove any other instances of rustc.exe and cargo.exe from your PATH.

   • mozconfig for i686-pc-windows-msvc:

     ac_add_options --target=i686-pc-windows-msvc
     ac_add_options --enable-optimize
     ac_add_options --enable-official-branding
     ac_add_options --enable-release
     ac_add_options --disable-sandbox
     ac_add_options --disable-tests

   • mozconfig for x86_64-pc-windows-msvc:

     ac_add_options --target=x86_64-pc-windows-msvc
     ac_add_options --enable-optimize
     ac_add_options --enable-official-branding
     ac_add_options --enable-release
     ac_add_options --disable-tests

   • ./mach build
     ./mach package
     ./mach build installers-AB-CD