Basilisk For Linux

One could argue that the web browser world is a bit stale and, in some respects, he or she might be right. While it's true that the better part of the market is dominated by the same two big names, smaller and specialized browsers are also remarkably interesting and good.

Basilisk is one such project, a XUL-based, free and open-source web browser.

Even though there's much to unpack for this discussion, to put it as simple as possible, Basilisk is a Firefox fork that comes with a series of unique features, and support for legacy extensions.

With that out of the way, who's Basilisk for shouldn't come as a surprise. It's a decent, very lightweight browser that should come in handy for those who are looking for a Chrome/Chromium-based browser alternatives, as well as for who, for whatever the reason (nostalgia or actual need), prefer the classic feel and look of Firefox and want legacy extension support.

The answer is: a lot different. For starters, it's worth noting that Basilisk uses an older Firefox GUI. The layout is rendered by Goanna (a fork of the Gecko rendering engine). Goanna renders web pages a bit differently in the sense that the colors are more accurately reproduced.

Basilisk also buils on the Unified XUL Platform (UXP), a fork of the Mozilla code but without Photon and Rust. Other important differentiators include the lack of Electrolysis (e10s, multi-process browsing), and the fact that Basilisk doesn't require walled-garden extension signing.

Basilisk comes with a ton of interesting features. For example, the browser comes with full support for JavaScript's ECMAscript6, support for all NPAPI plugins (Unity, Silverlight, Flash, Java, authentication plugins, and so forth), support for XUL, support for ALSO (on Linux), and support for WebAssembly (WASM).

The list of features continues with support for Graphite (advanced font shaping features), support for modern web cryptography (up to TSL 1.3, modern ciphers, HSTS, etc.), as well as support for both GTK2 and GTK3 on Linux.

Ok, so, is Basilisk a good browser for everyone? No, not really. Some old school aspects and defunct technologies don't make the fastest, the most secure, or the most versatile browser out there. Just try to load YouTube and you'll see what we mean.

To conclude, Basilisk is a decent Firefox fork that sports the classic look and feel before the Quantum update, and offers pretty decent (although not perfect) modern web support. It's a highly maintained active project, and it's probably the best possible browser for users who rely on one or multiple legacy Firefox extensions.