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.

Avatar for Username

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

This thread was archived. Please ask a new question if you need help.

Set Blank Placeholders for Top Sites on New Tab Page?

  • 2 replies
  • 1 has this problem
  • 13 views
  • Last reply by willowen100

willowen100
willowen100
more options

Hi

Is it possible to set placeholders for the Top Sites that I can define the links myself rather than pulling them from the most visited sites I've visited?

I want to hold 8 Top Links on my New Tab page but I want them to be initially blank in other words they don't go anywhere I till I click edit button.

Is this possible? Is there a way of separating the most visited sites from Top Sites buttons? Is there a way to blank all of the Top Site buttons without clearing my entire browser history?

Many thanks

Hi Is it possible to set placeholders for the Top Sites that I can define the links myself rather than pulling them from the most visited sites I've visited? I want to hold 8 Top Links on my New Tab page but I want them to be initially blank in other words they don't go anywhere I till I click edit button. Is this possible? Is there a way of separating the most visited sites from Top Sites buttons? Is there a way to blank all of the Top Site buttons without clearing my entire browser history? Many thanks

Chosen solution

Firefox stores the list of URLs you pin to a tile in a pref on the about:config page.
You can manually edit this JSON formatted list, but you need to be cautious not corrupt it.

  • browser.newtabpage.pinned => websites pinned to a tile
  • browser.newtabpage.blocked => websites removed by clicking the X (Dismiss) button in a tile

You can possibly reserve a tile by using "about:blank", tiles with a null value will be filled from the history

  • browser.newtabpage.pinned :
  • [null,null,null,null,null,null,null,null,null,{"url":"about:blank?1"},{"url":"about:blank?2"},{"url":"about:blank?3"},{"url":"about:blank?4"},{"url":"about:blank?5"},{"url":"about:blank?6"},{"url":"about:blank?7"},{"url":"about:blank?8"},{"url":"about:blank?9"}]

You can open the about:config page via the location/address bar. You can accept the warning and click "I accept the risk!" to continue.

Read this answer in context 👍 1

All Replies (2)

cor-el
cor-el
  • Moderator
  • Top 10 Contributor
more options

Chosen Solution

Firefox stores the list of URLs you pin to a tile in a pref on the about:config page.
You can manually edit this JSON formatted list, but you need to be cautious not corrupt it.

  • browser.newtabpage.pinned => websites pinned to a tile
  • browser.newtabpage.blocked => websites removed by clicking the X (Dismiss) button in a tile

You can possibly reserve a tile by using "about:blank", tiles with a null value will be filled from the history

  • browser.newtabpage.pinned :
  • [null,null,null,null,null,null,null,null,null,{"url":"about:blank?1"},{"url":"about:blank?2"},{"url":"about:blank?3"},{"url":"about:blank?4"},{"url":"about:blank?5"},{"url":"about:blank?6"},{"url":"about:blank?7"},{"url":"about:blank?8"},{"url":"about:blank?9"}]

You can open the about:config page via the location/address bar. You can accept the warning and click "I accept the risk!" to continue.

Modified by cor-el

willowen100
willowen100 Question owner
more options

This works perfectly.

I've managed to set 24 blank URL placeholders (3 rows of 8) in the `browser.newtabpage.pinned`, save the changes and restart the browser.

I wish this could be a main feature of Firefox allowing users to define the NewTab page links rather pulling them from most popular webpage visits. Even better if something like this was implemented a way of exporting and importing them and syncing them to our Firefox Sync accounts would be really efficient too.