Join the AMA (Ask Me Anything) with the Firefox leadership team to celebrate Firefox 20th anniversary and discuss Firefox’s future on Mozilla Connect. Mark your calendar on Thursday, November 14, 18:00 - 20:00 UTC!

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

chosen primary password not working anymore...

more options

A week ago I started using a primary password for FF. I learned it by heart, also copied it to my iPhone in a safe notation (I have access to the notation using my finger print). It worked just fine for the first days. Today I tried to use the primary password again, in order to enter a website, but somehow FF denies me entrance, again and again. No spelling issues or missing characters, because I copy the primary password from my iPhone notation and paste it into the primary password field on my Mac. In FF Lockwise (on my iPhone) I can also still see my primary FF password, which is exactly the same. Typing it down character by character doesn’t solve the problem, nor does restarting FF. Caps lock is off. No issues with my keyboard. In my privacy and security setting I cannot to stop FF from asking my primary password, because (of course also there) it won’t recognize the primary password I enter...

There is no one who knows about my primary password nor has anyone access to my computer or iPhone. So there is no way I could explain somebody to have been able to change my primary password. Could anybody please explain to me what might be going on? Did other people experience the same issue? What steps should I take to try to solve it?

And I surely wish not to need to reset my primary password, because I will lose all my saved passwords from FF... Happily I still have access to FF Lockwise on my iPhone (using my finger print). So I could still copy each password and save it somewhere else. But that would mean quite a lot of work. Besides of that I don’t trust it to work better next time I set up a primary FF password…

I hope I explained my problem well enough. Thanks in advance for trying to help me out!

A week ago I started using a primary password for FF. I learned it by heart, also copied it to my iPhone in a safe notation (I have access to the notation using my finger print). It worked just fine for the first days. Today I tried to use the primary password again, in order to enter a website, but somehow FF denies me entrance, again and again. No spelling issues or missing characters, because I copy the primary password from my iPhone notation and paste it into the primary password field on my Mac. In FF Lockwise (on my iPhone) I can also still see my primary FF password, which is exactly the same. Typing it down character by character doesn’t solve the problem, nor does restarting FF. Caps lock is off. No issues with my keyboard. In my privacy and security setting I cannot to stop FF from asking my primary password, because (of course also there) it won’t recognize the primary password I enter... There is no one who knows about my primary password nor has anyone access to my computer or iPhone. So there is no way I could explain somebody to have been able to change my primary password. Could anybody please explain to me what might be going on? Did other people experience the same issue? What steps should I take to try to solve it? And I surely wish not to need to reset my primary password, because I will lose all my saved passwords from FF... Happily I still have access to FF Lockwise on my iPhone (using my finger print). So I could still copy each password and save it somewhere else. But that would mean quite a lot of work. Besides of that I don’t trust it to work better next time I set up a primary FF password… I hope I explained my problem well enough. Thanks in advance for trying to help me out!

All Replies (3)

more options

You can install the About Sync extension in Firefox 72 and newer on desktop to check what data is stored on the Sync server via the about:sync page provided by this extension.

Close and restart Firefox to access the about:sync page added by this extension (see the about:about page for possible about pages).

more options

Thanks, but this doesn't help. If I go to the about:sync page, I have to fill in my Primary Password, which doesn't work anymore...

more options

I haven't found an answer to why I - mysteriously - couldn't use my Primary Password anymore. I was happy though to find out that resetting my FF Primary Password didn't influence the passwords in FF Lockwise. So by resetting I didn't loose any of my passwords and could easily choose a new Primary Password - which I hope will stay valid this time!