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

Where are my bookmarks?

  • 3 replies
  • 3 have this problem
  • 17 views
  • Last reply by cor-el

more options

Ok, so one the points of having FireFox sync is that when you log in to firefox from a new computer your data with be imported from the cloud to the computer. So where is my stuff? I did a factory reset on my laptop, and now all the stuff saved in my sync account is GONE! I need it back obviously I don't understand why I am choosing to "sync" my tabs, bookmarks, ect. whenever theyre gone when I try to access them from a new computer.

I need this data BACK PLEASE! It's very crucial.

And no, I didn't to a physical backup of my info. Whats the point of syncing of I still have to BACKUP??

Please help me get my stuff back.

Ok, so one the points of having FireFox sync is that when you log in to firefox from a new computer your data with be imported from the cloud to the computer. So where is my stuff? I did a factory reset on my laptop, and now all the stuff saved in my sync account is GONE! I need it back obviously I don't understand why I am choosing to "sync" my tabs, bookmarks, ect. whenever theyre gone when I try to access them from a new computer. I need this data BACK PLEASE! It's very crucial. And no, I didn't to a physical backup of my info. Whats the point of syncing of I still have to BACKUP?? Please help me get my stuff back.

All Replies (3)

more options

Oh dear

Do you use firefox on any other PC? if so chcek to see if it has kept its bookmarks, if so do a manual sync

Good luck Brad

more options

Sync is not a good idea for restoring your system. During the refresh process, data could be lost. __________________ Bookmark / History Backups

Type about:support<Enter> in the address bar.

Under the page logo on the left side you will see Application Basics. Under this find Profile Folder. To it’s right press the button Show Folder. This will open your file browser to the current Firefox profile. Now Close Firefox.

Enter the bookmarkbackups folder. This is where Firefox makes backups of your bookmarks. Look for the jsonlz4 file you want to restore (check the time / date / size). Right click on that file and select Copy. Now go back to the profile folder where you started. Rename the file places.sqlite by adding .old to it. Now right click in the folder and select Paste. The file you just pasted here, rename it to places.sqlite. After you are done, restart Firefox.


These can't get your data back, but will help in the future.

These add-ons can be a great help by backing up and restoring Firefox

FEBE (Firefox Environment Backup Extension) {web link} FEBE allows you to quickly and easily backup your Firefox extensions, history, passwords, and more. In fact, it goes beyond just backing up -- It will actually rebuild your saved files individually into installable .xpi files. It will also make backup of files that you choose.

OPIE {web link} Import/Export extension preferences

more options

Sync isn't meant to be used as a backup device, but merely to sync data between multiple devices. So it is not guaranteed that you can restore data from the Sync server.

If your computer still has the same name as used by Sync then it won't be recognized as a new device and it it likely that the data on the server got overwritten with empty data in the new setup.

You should always backup your personal data locally or possibly by your ISP if you have storage there.