Mozilla releases Firefox 50

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Mozilla has begun updating users to Firefox 50. The upgraded browser’s main attraction is faster startup speeds – particularly for users with a lot of extensions installed – but there are plenty of other handy upgrades to improve your everyday browsing.

If your operating system doesn’t support emoji by default (including Linux and older versions of Windows), you can now express yourself with icons built into your browser.

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Firefox 50 also features an improved ‘Find in page’ tool, enabling you to search for whole words only (so a search for ‘tech’ would highlight all uses of that word, but not ‘TechRadar’, for example).

Love your tabs, but find them awkward to navigate? With Firefox 50, you can cycle through those you’ve used most recently by tapping [Ctrl]+[Tab].

The new update is being rolled out for 32-bit Windows, 64-bit Windows, Mac and Linux. Your browser will be updated automatically – you don’t need to do anything. If you just can't wait, you can download the Firefox 5.0 beta for 32-bit Windows or 64-bit Windows.

Firefox 50 was originally scheduled for release last week, but was delayed while Mozilla resolved a JavaScript bug that was causing serious slowdown.

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The best web browser 2016

It's easy to get stuck in a rut, using the same web browser for years without considering the alternatives. Whether your main priority is speed, flexibility or efficiency, there's something for you.

• For more details, see our our full guide to the best web browsers

1. Google Chrome

A powerful and adaptable browser, Chrome is stable, well designed, and makes using the internet a joy.

2. Opera

Opera is an underrated browser with a superb Turbo mode for making the most of slow connections.

3. Microsoft Edge

Microsoft's new, user-friendly browser is fully integrated with Windows 10's key features.