Firefox is adding a built-in sports widget just in time for the World Cup

Mozilla is rushing to build a native sports widget directly into the default Firefox homepage so people can track the World Cup. The engineering team detailed the project in a recent Firefox Nightly News post, confirming the feature will display live soccer scores on the new tab screen.

The code is currently hidden behind configuration settings in experimental Nightly builds. Mozilla admitted they are working under a tight deadline, noting that “most of the team is heads down building out a sports-tracking widget” to ensure it launches before the tournament starts.

Public bug reports show developers actively fixing dark mode interface glitches on Android devices to hit that target.

That said, some Firefox users aren’t exactly excited about the widget. A recent poll on the Firefox subreddit asked if the browser needs a built-in sports widget. The final tally showed 144 people voting against it and only 11 voting for it.

From what I could gather after reading multiple comments, it looks like most users who are against the addition have one simple reason. They don’t want the team to be using its limited resources on random lifestyle widgets instead of fixing bugs or improving the general browsing experience.

Still, it’s hard to deny that mainstream features like a sports widget will likely attract casual internet users. So Mozilla has a decision to make here: either stick to the basics and keep existing users happy, or risk upsetting a chunk of users with hopes to release more features that could help rope in new ones.

This is also the perfect time for Firefox to grab more users if you look at the bigger picture. We’re seeing many folks looking for Chrome alternatives as Google keeps shoving AI everywhere. Brave even set a growth record with a 3.1% boost in daily active users and 117.56 million monthly active users.

Mozilla will have to take full advantage of this short window before people settle on other web browsers as their Chrome alternatives.

You can expect the sports tracker to roll out to the public very soon. The strict tournament deadline means Mozilla is pushing this feature live whether the core community wants it or not.

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