Quick one: no offence, is this a skinned firefox?

[masterofobzene]

I mean, is it firefox under the hood? no "special customization" ?

So far it looks like a re-skinned firefox. I would like some technical data; all I see is "zen" as the whole central idea, meaning "re skin" and that's all. I'm on librewolf, is it worth my time? I already got rid of sync stuff and pocket and all the bloat from firefox by using librewolf.

Gecko is slow. Firefox is slow. Chromium is better, but also used by the worst companies that want to suck data all the time. So I had to stay with gecko browsers. Is zen browser any different from using librewolf in regards to page loading speeds?

[dosubot[bot]]

Hi @masterofobzene! I'm Dosu and I’m helping the desktop team.

Zen Browser is indeed based on Firefox—specifically, it tracks recent upstream Firefox releases (for example, version 139.0.1) and applies its own layer of features and UI changes on top of that foundation. It is not just a "re-skinned" Firefox: Zen adds a range of workflow and interface enhancements that are not present in standard Firefox or LibreWolf. These include Workspaces, Split views, Vertical tabs, Tab groups, a Sidebar, a Welcome Page, and a custom Compact Mode, among others. The core of these features is implemented in Zen's own modules, separate from the upstream Firefox codebase (source, source).

Zen Browser also removes Firefox telemetry and pings, uses a private CDN for startup favicons, and modifies startup behavior to avoid external dependencies (source). It applies temporary patches from future Firefox versions as needed (source).

On the technical side, Zen Browser is still Gecko-based, like LibreWolf. In terms of raw page loading speed, there is no evidence that Zen Browser is faster than LibreWolf. In fact, some users have reported that Zen's custom UI (especially the use of rounded corners) can negatively impact rendering performance and smooth scrolling compared to Firefox and LibreWolf, due to limitations in Gecko's WebRender layer handling (source, source). Disabling rounded corners in Zen can bring performance closer to standard Firefox, but out of the box, you may see higher GPU usage and choppier scrolling in Zen compared to LibreWolf.

There are also reports that Zen Browser can experience lag with smooth scrolling enabled on some AMD integrated graphics systems, while this issue does not occur in LibreWolf (source). No direct benchmarks comparing page loading speeds between Zen and LibreWolf were found, but based on the architecture and user reports, you should not expect Zen to be faster than LibreWolf for page loads.

If your main concern is page loading speed and minimalism, and you already have LibreWolf set up without the bloat, Zen Browser is unlikely to offer a speed advantage. Its value is in its unique workflow features and interface customizations, not in raw performance.

To reply, just mention my name @dosu.

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[masterofobzene]

Now that's a honest bot!

Ok then, I think librewolf will still be my slow daily browser.
Thank you mr.Bot!