Mozilla is putting more AI into Firefox while giving users more ways to shut it off. Firefox 155, released Sept. 1, expands Smart Window, and Mozilla followed a day later by reiterating that users can block current and future AI enhancements or selectively enable individual features.
Enterprise deployments are less uniform across device types. Mozilla now supports centrally enforceable AI policies in standard desktop Firefox and Firefox ESR 153, while its public Android and iOS documentation describes user-facing controls without establishing equivalent centralized mobile enforcement.
Desktop AI controls expand with Smart Window
The Firefox 155 release notes add faster Smart Window responses using Exa web-search citations, improved AI-assisted tab organization, and personalized prompts for returning to previous work. Mozilla's Sept. 2 AI overview describes Smart Window as its most integrated AI experience, with access to browser context when users permit it.
Firefox's broader AI Controls can block supported AI features globally or manage them individually, including translations, AI-generated PDF alt text, tab-group suggestions, link-preview summaries, sidebar chatbots, and Smart Window.
Other vendors are drawing different boundaries around browser AI. Anthropic recently gave Claude a separate browser environment that does not automatically inherit a user's existing tabs, passwords, or sessions. Firefox instead embeds optional AI capabilities in the browser alongside controls over individual features.
Mobile Firefox has a smaller feature set. Current Android AI Controls cover Shake to Summarize, translations, and voice search. On iOS, AI Controls cover page summaries and translations, with availability varying by device, region, and Firefox version.
Processing can vary by device as well. On supported iPhones, Firefox page summaries use Apple Intelligence on an iPhone 15 Pro or later running iOS 26 or newer. Other supported devices use Mozilla-hosted services running Mistral Small 3.1.
What eWeek found: Desktop and ESR enforcement outpace mobile controls
Mozilla's technical documentation shows that AI Controls have become an administrative policy across current desktop Firefox release channels. The AIControls policy has been available in standard Firefox since 149.0.2 and reached Firefox ESR with version 153.
The policy exposes six configurable categories: Translations, PDFAltText, SmartTabGroups, LinkPreviewKeyPoints, SidebarChatbot, and SmartWindow. Administrators can block features and lock those choices through Windows Group Policy or Intune, macOS configuration, or policies.json.
Mozilla's public mobile documentation, by comparison, describes individual settings without documenting an equivalent centrally enforced Android or iOS AIControls policy. That leaves mixed desktop-and-mobile fleets with different management surfaces as organizations confront a broader gap between enterprise AI adoption and governance.
Firefox's native controls also stop at Mozilla-provided features. Its desktop AI Controls documentation says extensions can independently use third-party AI services even when Firefox AI enhancements are blocked. Security teams therefore still need to track which software can reach enterprise systems and under whose authority.
Firefox now provides a meaningful enforcement layer across desktop and ESR deployments, but consistent browser AI governance still requires separate controls for mobile devices, extensions, and external AI services.
Read more: OpenAI's decision to retire its standalone Atlas browser and move its browsing capabilities into ChatGPT shows how quickly AI browsing functions can shift between products, forcing enterprises to reassess where access and policy controls need to follow.
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