What is it you are trying to delete?

Previous searches that I have done and no longer want to appear

Click in the field, enter a character or two and STOP ! Using the arrow keys, highlight an unwanted entry. Then press Delete (Mac=Shift Delete). Repeat as needed.

Type about:preferences#privacy<enter> in the address bar. The button next to History, select Use Custom Settings.

At the bottom of the page, turn on Clear History When Firefox Closes. At the far right, press the Settings button. Turn on ONLY Cache and Form And Search History leaving the others off.

Hi I followed the instructions and restarted and started typing the words and they auto-completed again.

Hi HelpwithFirefox938373, where are you entering your search? For example:

• Firefox's main address bar (where page URLs appear)
• Firefox's optional short search bar to the right of the address bar
• A search box in Firefox's built-in home page
• Somewhere else?

Main address bar (I don't even see a short search bar to the right, just the one big one).

HelpwithFirefox938373 said

Main address bar (I don't even see a short search bar to the right, just the one big one).

So this problem is on the drop-down, you arrow down to the offending entry, Shift+Delete, it goes away, but on the next round, it's back?

I don't know what causes that, but another user reported a similar thing last month with Firefox 68: https://support.mozilla.org/questions/1264909 (not really solved)

As you recall, before Firefox 68, Windows users could remove an item by pressing Delete, without needing to use Shift. Maybe it would help to roll your Firefox back to that earlier drop-down code? At least for the moment, there's a preference for that:

(1) In a new tab, type or paste about:config in the address bar and press Enter/Return. Click the button promising to be careful or accepting the risk.

(2) In the search box above the list, type or paste URLB and pause while the list is filtered

(3) Double-click the browser.urlbar.quantumbar preference to switch the value from true to false

Does that make any difference?

Hi toggled the setting and deleted the entries which keep popping up both by hitting Shift-Delete and just Delete (both made them go away, but I restarted Firefox and both the entries reappear).

If you use Sync then best is to disconnect Sync temporarily during troubleshooting.

You can check for problems with the places.sqlite and favicons.sqlite files in the Firefox profile folder.

• use "Verify Integrity" button on the "Help -> Troubleshooting Information" (about:support) page

In case errors are reported with "Verify Integrity" close and restart Firefox and retry.

If "Verify Integrity" cannot repair places.sqlite, rename/remove all places.sqlite and favicons.sqlite files in the Firefox profile folder. Firefox will rebuild places.sqlite and restore the bookmarks from a recent JSON backup in the bookmarkbackups folder.

• keep a backup copy of places.sqlite in case a new places.sqlite database has to be created

See also:

• https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/Bookmarks+not+saved#w_fix-the-bookmarks-file
• https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/fix-bookmarks-and-history-will-not-be-functional

You can use the button on the "Help -> Troubleshooting Information" (about:support) page to go to the current Firefox profile folder or use the about:profiles page.

• Help -> Troubleshooting Information -> Profile Directory:
  Windows: Show Folder; Linux: Open Directory; Mac: Show in Finder
• https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/Profiles