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

Since v.24 (and perhaps v.23), Firefox doesn't quit properly on my Win7 computers (2 of them, anyway). THe exe file remains as a process until I kill it. Why?

  • 2 ŋuɖoɖowo
  • 13 masɔmasɔ sia le wosi
  • 8 views
  • Nuɖoɖo mlɔetɔ cor-el

more options

When I quit (using the close button), the window closes. However I am frequently unable to restart Firefox -- I get a system message saying that it is still running. When I look process tab of the Task Manager, a process called firefox.exe is in fact still running. However, there is no application in the application tab, and I can't switch to it. The process never ends buy itself.

I have to end the process or the process tree using the Task Manager. Only then can I restart Firefox. It seems to me that the problem has only begun to occur recently, perhaps with v.24.

This happens on two different Win7 machines. They are both fully patched

When I quit (using the close button), the window closes. However I am frequently unable to restart Firefox -- I get a system message saying that it is still running. When I look process tab of the Task Manager, a process called firefox.exe is in fact still running. However, there is no application in the application tab, and I can't switch to it. The process never ends buy itself. I have to end the process or the process tree using the Task Manager. Only then can I restart Firefox. It seems to me that the problem has only begun to occur recently, perhaps with v.24. This happens on two different Win7 machines. They are both fully patched

ChuckSott trɔe

All Replies (2)

more options

Some possibilities are suggested in the "Hang at exit" section of this article:

http://kb.mozillazine.org/Firefox_hangs#Hang_at_exit

There's quite a bit to work through there.

more options

Does this also happen if you use "Firefox > Exit" (Windows: Firefox/File > Exit; Mac: Firefox > Quit Firefox; Linux: Firefox/File > Quit) to close Firefox?

Start Firefox in Safe Mode to check if one of the extensions (Firefox/Firefox/Tools > Add-ons > Extensions) or if hardware acceleration is causing the problem (switch to the DEFAULT theme: Firefox/Firefox/Tools > Add-ons > Appearance).

  • Do NOT click the Reset button on the Safe Mode start window.

You can also check for problems caused by plugins.

In case you are using "Clear history when Firefox closes", try to exclude the cookies.