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Why do my open tabs (pages) have to reload when changing between tabs in firefox?

  • 5 replies
  • 1 has this problem
  • 1 view
  • Last reply by Papsy10

Papsy10
Papsy10
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At the moment I have 4 pages open in tabs.

But each of them except the current page have lost their content and if I switch back each tab has to reload the page.

This just started happening after the lastest update. 67.0

For example I am on support community page if I tab back to Youtube which was open, it is now blank, has the tab description but reloads the page.

It's the same for all the tabs.

Any ideas. It's very annoying and thinking perhaps time to switch to chrome.

At the moment I have 4 pages open in tabs. But each of them except the current page have lost their content and if I switch back each tab has to reload the page. This just started happening after the lastest update. 67.0 For example I am on support community page if I tab back to Youtube which was open, it is now blank, has the tab description but reloads the page. It's the same for all the tabs. Any ideas. It's very annoying and thinking perhaps time to switch to chrome.

Chosen solution

Hello Papsy10,

This sounds like one of the new features that came with the update to Firefox 67.0 :

See under "New" - suspending unused tabs

And also : https://blog.mozilla.org/blog/2019/05/21/latest-firefox-release-is-faster-than-ever/

If you want to disable this feature :

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

Type in the search bar and look for the preference :

browser.tabs.unloadOnLowMemory

and set its value to false

Then close and restart Firefox.

This should keep you from switching to Chrome .....

Read this answer in context 👍 0

All Replies (5)

McCoy
McCoy
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Chosen Solution

Hello Papsy10,

This sounds like one of the new features that came with the update to Firefox 67.0 :

See under "New" - suspending unused tabs

And also : https://blog.mozilla.org/blog/2019/05/21/latest-firefox-release-is-faster-than-ever/

If you want to disable this feature :

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

Type in the search bar and look for the preference :

browser.tabs.unloadOnLowMemory

and set its value to false

Then close and restart Firefox.

This should keep you from switching to Chrome .....

Papsy10
Papsy10 Question owner
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Worked a charm, thank you

McCoy
McCoy
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Papsy10 said

Worked a charm, thank you

My pleasure  ! (I'm glad everything is back to normal for you)

cor-el
cor-el
  • Moderator
  • Top 10 Contributor
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Since this is about a low memory case then you may want to check the Firefox memory usage.

Quote: Firefox will now detect if your computer’s memory is running low, which we define as lower than 400MB, and suspend unused tabs that you haven’t used or looked at in a while.

See also the Firefox Task Manager (about:performance) page.

Papsy10
Papsy10 Question owner
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Firefox uses a lot of memory compared to Chrome. At the moment with 5 tabs and no extensions its using 608 to 620 meg. Chrome on the other hand with the same tabs open it is 166meg. Big difference also Chrome doesnt crash as often as firefox which crashes constantly when using facebook.