| Release Date | March 23, 2027 |
|---|---|
| Release Owner | Donal Meehan |
| Corresponding ESR releases | 153.15.0 · 115.53.0? |
| Nightly cycle length | 2 weeks |
| Beta cycle length | 2 weeks |
| Milestones | |
|---|---|
Deadline to request manual QAQA has been informed via a Jira ticket (Functional, Nimbus/Remote delivery or Embedded QA) about features needing manual testing — more on how to file a Jira ticket here. Test Plans and Cases also require the technical documentation, which should be attached to the ticket. |
February 11 In 16 weeks |
Deadline to request accessibility engineering reviewAccessibility engineering review has been requested (using the |
February 18 In 17 weeks |
Nightly startsThe first day of the cycle is Merge Day. After merging firefox-main to the beta branch, we bump the nightly version number on firefox-main and a new development cycle starts for Firefox. A new Firefox Nightly is shipped every 12 hours. |
February 18 In 17 weeks |
Build ready for QAFeatures with a QA request are ready for testing to assess feature quality and provide a formal test report by the end of Week 2 of the nightly cycle. |
February 25 In 18 weeks |
QA Test Case reviewThe QA team appreciates an earlier sign-off from the project teams. The approval milestone will be the final deadline for any feature Test Plan sign-offs. No feedback/sign-off on QAs Feature Test Plan could result in misalignment on testing scope, incomplete test coverage and invalid bugs. |
February 26?
In 18 weeks |
Strings hand-off to engineeringFinal strings are handed off to Engineering to ensure they are landed before localization begins. |
March 1 In 18.5 weeks |
String Freeze startsIn order to ensure that our localizers have adequate time to translate strings, please make sure that all string changes have landed by end of day. |
March 3 In 19 weeks |
Nightly QA sign-offQA signs off on new features in Nightly by sharing individual test reports with their quality assessment and reasoning. |
March 3 In 19 weeks |
Draft beta release notesA draft document was created and shared internally with stakeholders to prepare our final release notes for general availability. This document initially contains a copy of our public beta release notes shipping the week after and will be enriched during the beta cycle with media and final copy. |
March 4 In 19 weeks |
Merge dayThis is the day in the release cycle when we merge firefox-main into the beta branch. This is the end of the development cycle for Firefox 168 and the beginning of our Beta stabilization cycle. |
March 4 In 19 weeks |
Beta 1First beta of the cycle, rolled out to our beta population. Build starts at 13:00 UTC. Stabilization work via uplifts. |
March 8 In 19.5 weeks |
Beta 2First automated beta of the cycle. It is rolled out to 100% of our beta population. Build starts at 13:00 UTC. |
March 10 In 20 weeks |
SUMO content creationUser affecting changes were identified and provided to the support.mozilla.org team. The support content for this release can now be created before release day. |
March 11 In 20 weeks |
Beta 3Build starts at 13:00 UTC. Stabilization work via uplifts. |
March 12 In 20 weeks |
Beta 4Build starts at 13:00 UTC. Stabilization work via uplifts. |
March 15 In 20.5 weeks |
Deadline to request security bug uplifts ESR patches must be readyDeadline for security bugs uplift requests ( |
March 16 In 20.5 weeks |
Beta 5 Last beta upliftsLast beta of the cycle and thus the end of beta uplifts. Build starts at 13:00 UTC. |
March 17 In 21 weeks |
Release notes submission deadlineAll release notes for Firefox were added to the draft document or communicated directly with the release manager. Illustrations such as screenshots and videos were provided. Final Release release notes are created by the release manager on firefox.com. |
March 18 In 21 weeks |
Release Candidate Ready for QAThis is the build we intend to ship a week later unless we need to build another Release Candidate to fix a major quality or business critical issue. |
March 18 In 21 weeks |
Release day!Firefox 168 ships at 13:00 UTC (6 AM PT) with an initial 25% rollout. |
March 23 In 21.5 weeks |
Dot release 1Scheduled for one week after launch, this Desktop and/or Android release targets critical quality fixes and selective feature uplifts. The deadline for uplift requests is EOD on the Friday prior to go-live. Should emergency dot releases ship earlier and resolve pending issues, the Release Management team will determine if this scheduled milestone remains necessary. |
March 30 In 22.5 weeks |
| Milestones | |
|---|---|
168.0 branch is createdThe |
March 12 |
168.0 release candidate is createdThe 168.0 release candidate is created based on the |
March 12 |
Preliminary QA sign off on 168.0QA gives a preliminary sign off on 168.0. If it is green, we push the build to the External Beta Testers group. Otherwise, the dev team fixes the issues reported by QA, uplift them to the release branch and we build another Release Candidate. |
March 15 |
Final QA sign off on 168.0 Release notes readyQA gives its final sign off on 168.0. If the sign off is red, the dev team fixes the issues reported by QA, uplift them to the release branch and we build another Release Candidate. |
March 16 |
168.0 sent to Apple StoreWe submit 168.0 for review to the Apple Store. If we don`t have a working build by the end of the day, we may not ship this week. |
March 16 |
168.1 branch is createdThe |
March 19 |
168.1 release candidate is createdThe 168.1 release candidate is created based on the |
March 19 |
168.0 is shipped168.0 is shipped on the Apple Store at 3:00 AM UTC with a phased 7 days rollout: |
March 22 |
Preliminary QA sign off on 168.1QA gives a preliminary sign off on 168.1. If it is green, we push the build to the External Beta Testers group. Otherwise, the dev team fixes the issues reported by QA, uplift them to the release branch and we build another Release Candidate. |
March 22 |
Final QA sign off on 168.1 Release notes readyQA gives its final sign off on 168.1. If the sign off is red, the dev team fixes the issues reported by QA, uplift them to the release branch and we build another Release Candidate. |
March 23 |
168.1 sent to Apple StoreWe submit 168.1 for review to the Apple Store. If we don`t have a working build by the end of the day, we may not ship this week. |
March 25 |
168.1 is shipped168.1 is shipped on the Apple Store at 3:00 AM UTC with a phased 7 days rollout: |
March 29 |