Mozilla is planning a Firefox VPN, with a beta expected in three months

Firefox
Image credit: Shutterstock (Image credit: Shutterstock)

TechRadar has found evidence that Mozilla is planning to release a premium VPN subscription for Firefox, which could cost $12.99 (about £10, AU$20) per month.

A page hidden on Firefox's website appears to give users the opportunity to sign up for the service, but when clicked, the subscription button instead leads to a survey to assess interest.

However, if you skip the survey, you're given the opportunity to sign up for notifications "when Firefox Private Network beta becomes available". The page notes that it could take up to three months before you receive an email, giving a rough timeframe for when the VPN will become available.

Mozilla has previously experimented with promoting Proton VPN's premium service within Firefox, but the new Firefox Private Network appears to be something different, developed by Mozilla itself.

Other news outlets have reported on a similar subscription page offering ad-free news on Firefox for a monthly fee of $4.99 (about £4, AU$7). 

As ZDNet reports, clicking the sign-up button again leads to a survey, but there's no ability to skip it. After completing the survey, a confirmation page reveals that the proposed service is a partnership with Scroll, which works with publishers to provide content without advertisements.

Both pages are hosted on the subdomain https://firstlook.firefox.com/, which so far contains no other visible content, but we'll be keeping an eye out for more possible premium Firefox options appearing there soon.

Firefox VPN signup

Image credit: Mozilla (Image credit: Mozilla)

Firefox will still be free

Last month, Mozilla CEO Chris Beard hinted that a subscription version of Firefox could be available by the end of 2019, but didn't describe what features paying users might receive.

The paid-for options will be optional, though, and Dave Camp, senior vice president of Firefox said that "A high-performing, free and private-by-default Firefox browser will continue to be central to our core service offerings."

Cat Ellis

Cat is the editor of TechRadar's sister site Advnture. She’s a UK Athletics qualified run leader, and in her spare time enjoys nothing more than lacing up her shoes and hitting the roads and trails (the muddier, the better)