Mobile/GeckoView

GeckoView wraps Mozilla's Gecko browser engine in a reusable Android library for applications that wish to use Mozilla’s JavaScript, HTML layout, and rendering engines (generally referred to as SpiderMonkey and Gecko).

Mozilla uses GeckoView to power Firefox for Android, Firefox Reality, Firefox Focus, and other Android apps. GeckoView serves a similar purpose to Android's built-in WebView, but it has its own APIs and is not a drop in replacement.

Why GeckoView?

While Android offers a built-in WebView, it's not intended for building browsers, and many advanced Web APIs are disabled. Android's WebView is also a moving target: it's impossible know exactly which engine (and what version of that engine) will power a WebView on client devices.

In contrast, GeckoView is:

• Full-Featured: GeckoView is designed to expose the entire power of the Web to applications, including being suitable for building web browsers.
• Self-Contained: Because GeckoView is a standalone library that you bundle with your application, you can be confident that the code you test is the code that will actually run.
• Standards Compliant: Like Firefox, GeckoView offers excellent support for modern Web standards.

About GeckoView

Mozilla provides a GeckoView package and a Maven Repo along with package documentation. GeckoView has Stable, Beta, and Nightly channels that follow the Firefox browser’s Release Calendar which typically ships a new major version to the Stable channel every 4 weeks and the maven repository is updated accordingly.

When a new version is released to the Stable channel, any relevant security fixes will be published to the Mozilla Security Advisories page. While GeckoView is not explicitly called out in the advisories, most but not strictly all vulnerabilities will affect GeckoView. Exceptions would be vulnerabilities that occur in user-facing components excluded from GeckoView (such as the address bar) or desktop-platform-specific vulnerabilities. Keeping the GeckoView dependency up-to-date is the most effective way to incorporate security fixes.

Getting Help

Interested in GeckoView? We're here to help!

If you have questions or need assistance, please reach out to us in the #geckoview Matrix room.

The overall Mozilla security team can be reached at security@mozilla.org. If you ship GeckoView in your application you are encouraged to let us know at that address.

Get Started

Building a browser? Check out Android Components, our collection of ready-to-use support libraries!

Configure Gradle

1. Set the GeckoView version

Like Firefox, GeckoView has three release channels: Stable, Beta, and Nightly. Browse the Maven Repository to see currently available builds.

ext {
    geckoviewChannel = "nightly"
    geckoviewVersion = "70.0.20190712095934"
}

2. Add Mozilla's Maven repository

repositories {
    maven {
        url "https://maven.mozilla.org/maven2/"
    }
}

3. Configure Java 8 support

android {
    // ...

    // Note: compileOptions is only required for minSdkVersion < 24
    compileOptions {
        sourceCompatibility JavaVersion.VERSION_1_8
        targetCompatibility JavaVersion.VERSION_1_8
    }
}

4. Add GeckoView Implementations

dependencies {
    // ...
    implementation "org.mozilla.geckoview:geckoview-${geckoviewChannel}:${geckoviewVersion}"   
}

Add GeckoView to a Layout

Inside a layout .xml file, add the following:

<org.mozilla.geckoview.GeckoView
    android:id="@+id/geckoview"
    android:layout_width="fill_parent"
    android:layout_height="fill_parent" />

Initialize GeckoView in an Activity

1. Import the GeckoView classes inside an Activity:

import org.mozilla.geckoview.GeckoRuntime;
import org.mozilla.geckoview.GeckoSession;
import org.mozilla.geckoview.GeckoView;

2. In that activity's onCreate function, add the following:

GeckoView view = findViewById(R.id.geckoview);
GeckoSession session = new GeckoSession();
GeckoRuntime runtime = GeckoRuntime.create(this);

session.open(runtime);
view.setSession(session);
session.loadUri("about:buildconfig"); // Or any other URL...

You're done!

Your application should now load and display a webpage inside of GeckoView.

To learn more about GeckoView's capabilities, review GeckoView's JavaDoc or the reference application.

Documentation and Examples

APIs

• GeckoView API Documentation (JavaDoc format)
• Android Components APIs

Building / Contributing

• GeckoView Contributor Quick Start Guide.
• Mobile/Get_Involved
• Mozilla Developer Guide

Bugs

• File a new GeckoView bug
• All GeckoView Bugs
• GeckoView Bug Dashboard 🐛

Products / Examples

• Firefox Preview (GitHub)
• Firefox Reality (GitHub)
• Firefox Focus (GitHub)
• GeckoView Reference Application

Minimum System Requirements

• GeckoView, Fenix, and Focus all require Android 5.0 (API 21) or later.
• 32-bit ARMv7-A, 64-bit ARMv8-A (aka ARM64), 32-bit x86, or x86_64 CPU
• Minimum device specs are quad-core 1.2 GHz and 2 GB RAM (like the Moto G4 Play, E4, or E5), though Mozilla's GeckoView test devices are the Moto G5 with an octa-core 1.4 GHz CPU and 2 GB RAM and the Google Pixel 2 with an octa-core 1.9 GHz CPU and 4 GB RAM.