2012 saw a few updates to Firefox with improvements of all types, and alongside those we've seen plenty of add-ons to customize your browsing experience. Here are the most popular Firefox extensions and posts from the last year.


It's no secret that there's big money to be made in violating your privacy. Companies will pay big bucks to learn more about you, and service providers on the web are eager to get their hands on as much information about you as possible. More »


With each update, Facebook has gotten incrementally more cluttered, perplexing, and ornery-and I'm not even talking about all your annoying acquaintances flooding it with inane status updates. More »



Election Day is over, and we all know what that means: tomorrow you'll wake up to an onslaught of annoying, ignorant Facebook posts from your friends (God love 'em) complaining about whichever candidate won. More »



Firefox 13 is out and it's all about speed, Opera 12 has added a few new features, and Chrome is still cranking out new versions, so we thought it time for another browser speed test. More »



Stop me if you've heard this one: Once upon a time, you visited a web site that you're not exactly proud of. Let's say the content of said web site rhymes with "corn". More »



Firefox: We talk a lot about privacy at Lifehacker, specifically about how your activities are tracked on the web and what you can do to stop it. If you're still on the fence or not convinced that the issue is as widespread as it is, Collusion is a Firefox extension that will show you in real time... More »



You probably use YouTube every single day, but it's not something you think about tweaking the way you do, say, Gmail. Yet YouTube is filled with annoyances, like obnoxious autoplay, intrusive ads, and mind-numbingly stupid comments (to name a few). More »



Now that Mountain Lion's out with a shiny new version of Safari 6, we thought it time to revisit our browser speed tests. As always, we're pitting the four most popular browsers-this time, on a Mac-against one another in a battle of startup speed, tab loading prowess, and lots more. More »



Gmail is Google's golden child, but it isn't perfect. It's full of numerous user interface elements you don't necessarily want or need and there's no way to turn them off. More »



Chrome/Firefox:Everyone's trying to track you on the web, and it's hard to keep track of every privacy setting you need to tweak. Privacyfix is here to help, showing you which privacy-invading features you have turned on in Facebook and Google, plus how to keep other sites from tracking you. More »



Chrome/Firefox: HTTPS Everywhere is a simple extension that, with just a one-click installation, can seriously increase your security on over 1,400 web sites by encrypting your connection. More »



There's a strange joy in keeping 20 tabs open and pretending like you have the ability to multitask and actually manage all of them. But in reality, most browsers buckle under the pressure of too many tabs and you start to lose track of what you have open. More »



If you're a night owl, you know how much a regular white web page can hurt your eyes when you open it up. Here are two browser extensions for Chrome and Firefox that will make the web a little bit nicer at night. More »



A lot of us stare at a computer monitor for the bulk of our day and reading long articles or books is rarely a comfortable experience. With that in mind, here's a few steps you can take to make you reading experience less terrible.

The key to getting your computer monitor into shape is partially... More »



Despite the increase in the variety of ways you can consume media and learn about news, Google Reader is still the default news reader for many. While you can always find a good desktop RSS reader to suit your needs, many people still prefer the plain old web experience. More »



If Gmail's ads-especially the new, experimental image ads-are annoying you but you don't want to go all out and install a sledgehammer ad blocker like AdBlock Plus, here are a few ways to keep Gmail ads from infiltrating your inbox. More »



Chrome/Firefox/Internet Explorer: Facebook Chat now includes a feature that lets you know when a friend has read your message-or when you've read theirs. More »


And there you have it. It was a big year for Firefox with plenty of incremental updates and lot of handy new tricks. If you're hunting for more Firefox goodness, check out our best Firefox posts from 2011, 2010, and 2009.