I tried Firefox 139’s new AI-Generated Link-Bearing-and While I Love the Idea I skip them for an important reason

Firefox 139 has added an AI-driven link preview function
This summarizes web pages without you needing to click a link
As AL AI -Generation does need time to think – which can be a pain

With artificial intelligence (AI) all rage these days, finding your favorite web browser has added a lot of AI features designed to change the way you surf the internet. Firefox is no exception: As explained in the release notes in its latest Version 139 update, the browser has brought AI-powered link previews to its users.

Once the experimental feature is enabled, you can activate it by hovering your mouse marker over a link and pressing Alt+Shift. This fires up a preview box that summarizes key info on the web page so you can see what it is about without having to visit.

At first glance I love this idea. Imagine you are landing on a web page and you are not sure if you can rely on its embedded links. Or you’re super busy and just want to know if it’s worth clicking through to a pierced page. With an AI -Link example, you can get artificial intelligence to do the work for you.

Firefoxs AI comes into play by showing a set of key points that summarize the main ideas on the linked page, which helps you understand it before clicking through. But even though it originally sounds good, I’m not quite convinced yet.

A good idea with an annoying error

(Image Credit: Future)

I’ve been a Loyal Firefox user for 20 years now and I’ve seen it change a huge amount in that time. And with the increase of AI, I should not be surprised that Developer Mozilla has leaned into machine learning functions in recent years.

While Link -Previews feel like a good idea on the surface – first, they let you check if a link is actually what it claims to be without having to click and find out – they suffer from a common AI problem: You have to wait for them to be generated. It’s the same with tools like Chatgpt where you need to wait for AI to think up an answer. Firefox’s LINK LANGUAGES ARE NOT ATTEMBER, AND when I tried them, I found that they ended up slowing down my browser experience.

They still need to be activated with a particular keyboard shortcut, which means they do not appear when you simply hover over a link, minimizing the risk of unintended activations. It’s good, as a slow generating box that hides the text you are trying to read would quickly become annoying. As it is, you can activate the previews if you want, or ignore them completely if you don’t.

This is far from the only AI tool that Firefox has added over the past year or so. You can now add an AI -Chatbot to your sidebar, use AI to review your tab groups and more. And while Link -Previews help it follow the current tech -zeitgeist, I’m not sure it’s a feature I’m using a whole lot right now.

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