I switched to Chrome as my primary browser almost right after it was released. The UI was minimal and fast, and I loved it. And the developer tools matured at lightning speed, so it wasn’t long before I dropped Firefox for development too. And Firefox was relegated to the status of “testing only,” right alongside IE.

But here’s the thing: I really want Firefox to succeed. This has been thrown in to sharp relief lately, as we’ve seen Chrome/Blink start to throw their weight around (also: meme version).

So here’s why I still love Firefox and Mozilla.

Firefox is 100% open source. You don’t have to wonder what they’re doing with your data – you can see for yourself.

Firefox stuck their neck out for unencumbered video formats. And they’re doing the same now, fighting against DRM.

Their documentation is second to none. From JS to CSS to DOM to HTML5 to helping you fix the code you wrote for other browsers. (Oh, and don’t forget to click on MDN in your search results, not the site that shall not be named!)

Mozilla is working on all sorts of fantastic projects to help move the web forward. There’s Servo, Firefox OS, and asm.js, among many others.

Mozilla’s mission is to, “promote openness, innovation & opportunity on the Web.” And their manifesto is even better.

So I’m going to put my money where my mouth is and switch back to Firefox for browsing. I’m not quite ready to switch for development yet – but the dev tools have made some great progress, and I’m expecting more to come.

I love Firefox and Mozilla because I know I can count on them do do what’s right for the web. And I don’t know if I can say that about any other browser.