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How can I disable the search engines in search autocomplete and restore tab behavior?

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Since the upgrade to Firefox 57, search suggestions show a list of my search engines below the suggestions and the current engine above them as shown in the attached screenshot. This information only gets in the way. All I want is to see the search suggestions and nothing else but there doesn't seem to be an option to disable them. How can they be hidden?

These also cause problems with tabbing behavior. Typing a term and tabbing switches between engines, which isn't intuitive and makes it impossible to select a suggestion by tabbing and forces me to use the arrow keys. In previous versions, tabbing used to tab through the suggestions, which is intuitive and consistent with how the URL bar works. Switching search engines required changing using Cmd + up/down (which still works) or changing the icon next to the search box via a dropdown. This was also much more intuitive. How can that tabbing behavior be restored?

Since the upgrade to Firefox 57, search suggestions show a list of my search engines below the suggestions and the current engine above them as shown in the attached screenshot. This information only gets in the way. All I want is to see the search suggestions and nothing else but there doesn't seem to be an option to disable them. How can they be hidden? These also cause problems with tabbing behavior. Typing a term and tabbing switches between engines, which isn't intuitive and makes it impossible to select a suggestion by tabbing and forces me to use the arrow keys. In previous versions, tabbing used to tab through the suggestions, which is intuitive and consistent with how the URL bar works. Switching search engines required changing using Cmd + up/down (which still works) or changing the icon next to the search box via a dropdown. This was also much more intuitive. How can that tabbing behavior be restored?
Attached screenshots

All Replies (12)

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If you're adamant on this, try downgrading to Firefox 52 ESR, which is supported with security updates until May 2018, get it here: https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/organizations/all/

If this solved your problem, mark as solution!

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Hi  !

Would you try this :

Type in the address bar about:config (press Enter) (promise to be careful, if asked)

Type in the search bar and look for the preference :

browser.urlbar.oneOffSearches

And set its value to false

Then close and restart Firefox.

Any good  ?

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Happy112, this only controls if the search engines appear in the URL bar but not the separate search bar.

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Nick Rougeux said

Happy112, this only controls if the search engines appear in the URL bar but not the separate search bar.

Have you tried it  ?

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Happy112 said

Nick Rougeux said
Happy112, this only controls if the search engines appear in the URL bar but not the separate search bar.

Have you tried it  ?

Yes, which is how I know it only controls the engines that appear in the URL bar.

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I guess this is not what you are talking about then :

https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/questions/1171243

My bad - sorry  !

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Happy112 said

I guess this is not what you are talking about then : https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/questions/1171243 My bad - sorry  !

Nope. Though that was helpful when originally figuring out how to remove them from the URL bar. See the screenshot in my original post for what I'm looking to remove.

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If nothing else, try 52 ESR with a fresh profile, or see Aris' CSS config (creator of CTR) here: https://github.com/Aris-t2/CustomCSSforFx

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Not giving up just yet - would you try this pref in about:config :

browser.urlbar.searchSuggestionsChoice

See this thread :

https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/questions/1173004

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Happy112 said

Not giving up just yet - would you try this pref in about:config : browser.urlbar.searchSuggestionsChoice See this thread : https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/questions/1173004

I must have tried that already since it's already set to false and doesn't seem to make a difference.

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Running completely out of ideas, so I'll just leave you in the capable hands of my fellow contributors ...... Somebody is bound to come up with the perfect solution  !

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Thanks. I'd be happy to install an extension if one exists too.