Firefox Smart Window, Mozilla’s opt-in AI browsing mode, now pulls from current web information and shows source links within chat responses through a partnership with Exa. The update marks a shift towards helping users revisit and verify what they have already seen, rather than simply generating fresh search results.
Alongside the new citations, Smart Window can automatically suggest tab groups and display visual previews of pages you have previously visited when you search your browsing history using natural language. A live demonstration showed the AI sorting through selected links in a user’s browsing history to surface, for example, “running shoes I looked at last week”, complete with images pulled from the sites browsed earlier.
The suggested tab groups can also find and close duplicates, making it easier to keep track of what matters. According to Mozilla, the feature can help you check answers or find your place again, particularly when you remember what was on a page without recalling which page it was. Mozilla says beta users reported that it helped them maintain their train of thought.
How Smart Window is evolving
Future updates will add Chrome-like surfacing of recent browsing journeys, along with AI-powered autofill for online forms. Smart Window remains an opt-in beta feature, and Mozilla’s head of Firefox, Ajit Varma, confirmed there is no precise date yet for when it will leave beta.
The mode was originally announced as “AI Window”, offering AI features such as searching through open tabs or browser history using natural language. Since then, Mozilla has added an AI Controls section to Firefox’s settings, where users can switch off all of the browser’s AI features or select which ones to keep active.
Model choice and data handling
Varma said Mozilla is taking an “agnostic” approach to AI in Firefox, offering features like Smart Window to those who want them without forcing everyone to use them. Users can choose which AI model powers Smart Window, including Google’s Gemini 3.1 Flash Lite, OpenAI’s oss-gpt-120b, Alibaba’s Qwen3-235B-A22B-Instruct-2507, or their own local AI models.
Varma pointed to the value of digital sovereignty, noting that users can pick local AIs or models from companies based in their own region. Firefox AI senior staff product manager Steve Truong said the available models operate under a zero-data-retention contract. When Mozilla works with third parties providing inference or API calls, it ensures they process the user prompt in memory and do not store anything to train their models or support advertising.
The Exa partnership that enables current web information and source links in chat responses is available in Firefox starting today.
Source
Image: theverge.com
