This site will have limited functionality while we undergo maintenance to improve your experience. If an article doesn't solve your issue and you want to ask a question, we have our support community waiting to help you at @FirefoxSupport on Twitter and/r/firefox on Reddit.

Search Support

Avoid support scams. We will never ask you to call or text a phone number or share personal information. Please report suspicious activity using the “Report Abuse” option.

Learn More

Nonresponsive new tabs

  • 2 cavab
  • 1 has this problem
  • 6 views
  • Last reply by cor-el

more options

Hello!

I am enjoying Firefox and want to stick with it. I've had no problems until recently, but lately I've noticed that when I open a new tab, and enter either a search term or a web address in the search/address bar and hit Enter, about 1/4 to 1/3rd of the time, that tab will not respond to that input.

I hit enter, and the tab goes white. The loading bar will get to exactly halfway across the screen, and stop. Or there will be no progress bar, just the little "loading" animation on the tab header. Then it'll do nothing. If I open another new tab and give it the exact same input, often it'll load the requested page immediately.

I've tried running the browser in safe mode to eliminate my (few) extensions, but I can get the same behaviour.

This is getting annoying enough that I've come here and written this post. If anyone can help, I'd be really grateful.

Cheers,

- Ed
Hello! I am enjoying Firefox and want to stick with it. I've had no problems until recently, but lately I've noticed that when I open a new tab, and enter either a search term or a web address in the search/address bar and hit Enter, about 1/4 to 1/3rd of the time, that tab will not respond to that input. I hit enter, and the tab goes white. The loading bar will get to exactly halfway across the screen, and stop. Or there will be no progress bar, just the little "loading" animation on the tab header. Then it'll do nothing. If I open another new tab and give it the exact same input, often it'll load the requested page immediately. I've tried running the browser in safe mode to eliminate my (few) extensions, but I can get the same behaviour. This is getting annoying enough that I've come here and written this post. If anyone can help, I'd be really grateful. Cheers, - Ed
Attached screenshots

All Replies (2)

more options

I am not sure exactly what the problem is. Maybe this article will help Websites show a spinning wheel and never finish loading Keep us updated!

more options

Do you remember ever having used the Firefox 78.0 version ?

Do you have the Firefox 78.0.1 update as this version has a fix for search related issues ?

  • Help -> About Firefox

You can rename/remove search.json.mozlz4 (and possible search.json, search-metadata.json, search.sqlite) in the Firefox profile folder with Firefox closed to rebuild the search engines registry.

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.

Firefox will rebuild the search.json.mozlz4 file from the builtin search engines.