Mozilla today announced that Firefox will be available in Microsoft's Windows Store. Firefox is the first third-party alternative available in Microsoft Store. It uses its own Gecko browser engine, instead of Chromium alternatives such as Opera or other alternatives that use Microsoft Edge webview.
Microsoft's open-store policies finally allow third-party browsers such as Firefox to be listed in the Microsoft Store. Opera, a browser it developed, has also been added to the Microsoft Store.
Mozilla explains that Firefox was previously only available to Windows users who downloaded it from the internet. This made it difficult to install Firefox on Windows. Firefox is now easier to choose as your desktop browser, thanks to Microsoft's new Store policies. It also comes with all the latest Firefox features.
Firefox's launch into the Microsoft Store is just months after Mozilla beat Microsoft's default browser protections for Windows. Mozilla quietly made it simpler to switch to Firefox for Windows with one click. This process is not available to anyone else than Microsoft. Mozilla seems to have reverse engineered Microsoft’s ability to make Edge the default browser in Windows. This is in contrast to the multi-prompt process in Windows 10.
This one-click process does not appear to work in Firefox's Microsoft Store version. Mozilla did not submit its workaround Firefox version, or Microsoft rejected it from Microsoft Store. The company was then forced to delete the default browser workaround.
Microsoft has made setting the default browser more difficult in Windows 11. Mozilla has tried to persuade Microsoft to improve its default browser settings since 2015, when it opened a letter to Microsoft.
Firefox is now available on the Microsoft Store for Windows 10 and Windows 11.
