Google search engine not showing up in settings?
Just installed Firefox my laptop, but when I try to change my search engine to google I only have Bing and DuckDuckGo as my options. No other search engines appear.
All Replies (11)
See:
- https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/change-your-default-search-settings-firefox
- https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/add-or-remove-search-engine-firefox
If clearing the "Restore Default Search Engines" on the "Settings -> Search" page doesn't work, try to rename/remove search.json.mozlz4 in the Firefox profile folder with Firefox closed to rebuild the search engines registry.
You can use the button on the "Help -> More Troubleshooting Information" (about:support) page to go to the current Firefox profile folder or use the about:profiles page (Root directory).
- Help -> More Troubleshooting Information -> Profile Folder/Directory:
Windows: Open Folder; Linux: Open Directory; Mac: Show in Finder - https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/profiles-where-firefox-stores-user-data
Firefox will rebuild search.json.mozlz4 from the built-in search engines.
cor-el said
See:If clearing the "Restore Default Search Engines" on the "Settings -> Search" page doesn't work, try to rename/remove search.json.mozlz4 in the Firefox profile folder with Firefox closed to rebuild the search engines registry. You can use the button on the "Help -> More Troubleshooting Information" (about:support) page to go to the current Firefox profile folder or use the about:profiles page (Root directory).
- https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/change-your-default-search-settings-firefox
- https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/add-or-remove-search-engine-firefox
Firefox will rebuild search.json.mozlz4 from the built-in search engines.
- Help -> More Troubleshooting Information -> Profile Folder/Directory:
Windows: Open Folder; Linux: Open Directory; Mac: Show in Finder- https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/profiles-where-firefox-stores-user-data
I tried deleting the search.json.mozlz4 file but I still only have Bing and DDG as my available search engines. Clicking "Restore Default Search Engines"doesn't do anything either.
If you want to add Google, one way is to visit the Mycroft Project (remove the blank space in the link below).
https://mycroftproject. com/search-engines.html
That's very strange because Google is the default search engine. Also, with a fresh search.json.mozlz4 file, the "Restore Default Search Engines" is grayed out because you already have all the defaults. Puzzling. Suspicious.
Could you check whether your Firefox has any search-related policies operating? Type or paste about:policies in the address bar and press Enter to load that internal page. Normally, the Active panel just says
The Enterprise Policies service is inactive.
Does yours list anything else?
jscher2000 - Support Volunteer said
That's very strange because Google is the default search engine. Also, with a fresh search.json.mozlz4 file, the "Restore Default Search Engines" is grayed out because you already have all the defaults. Puzzling. Suspicious. Could you check whether your Firefox has any search-related policies operating? Type or paste about:policies in the address bar and press Enter to load that internal page. Normally, the Active panel just says The Enterprise Policies service is inactive. Does yours list anything else?
I assume you're talking about this page? It just shows this line. Not sure if it's what you'[re talking about?
Thank you for checking that. Policies also can add/remove search engines, so I wanted to see whether that was the explanation. But instead, there's no obvious explanation.
In case the program files somehow got corrupted, could you reinstall Firefox using a full (offline) installer. This article has a link to the download page: Custom installation of Firefox on Windows.
What security software do you have?
Seeing the "Your browser is being managed by your organization" notification at the top of the Settings page is in most cases caused by security software that uses GPO policy rules to inject their root certificate in Firefox to be able to intercept and monitor your internet traffic.
Note that you can click the "Your browser is being managed by your organization" notification or open the about:policies page to see if policies are active and if errors are reported.
Can you post your troubleshooting information ?
cor-el said
What security software do you have? Seeing the "Your browser is being managed by your organization" notification at the top of the Settings page is in most cases caused by security software that uses GPO policy rules to inject their root certificate in Firefox to be able to intercept and monitor your internet traffic. Note that you can click the "Your browser is being managed by your organization" notification or open the about:policies page to see if policies are active and if errors are reported.
Can you post your troubleshooting information ?
Application Basics
Name: Firefox Version: 105.0 Build ID: 20220915150737 Distribution ID: Update Channel: release User Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64; rv:105.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/105.0 OS: Windows_NT 10.0 19044 Launcher Process: Enabled Multiprocess Windows: 1/1 Fission Windows: 1/1 Enabled by default Remote Processes: 11 Enterprise Policies: Active Google Location Service Key: Found Google Safebrowsing Key: Found Mozilla Location Service Key: Found Safe Mode: false Memory Size (RAM): 15.9 GB Disk Space Available: 3.4 GB
Crash Reports for the Last 3 Days
Firefox Features
Name: Firefox Screenshots Version: 39.0.1 ID: screenshots@mozilla.org
Name: Form Autofill Version: 1.0.1 ID: formautofill@mozilla.org
Name: Picture-In-Picture Version: 1.0.0 ID: pictureinpicture@mozilla.org
Name: Web Compatibility Interventions Version: 105.2.0 ID: webcompat@mozilla.org
Name: WebCompat Reporter Version: 1.5.0 ID: webcompat-reporter@mozilla.org
Remote Features
Remote Processes
Type: Privileged About Count: 1
Type: Extension Count: 1
Type: Isolated Web Content Count: 4
Type: Preallocated Count: 3
Type: GPU Count: 1
Type: Socket Count: 1
Add-ons
Name: Adblock Plus - free ad blocker Type: extension Version: 3.14.2 Enabled: true ID: {d10d0bf8-f5b5-c8b4-a8b2-2b9879e08c5d}
Name: Add-ons Search Detection Type: extension Version: 2.0.0 Enabled: true ID: addons-search-detection@mozilla.com
Name: Amazon.com Type: extension Version: 1.3 Enabled: true ID: amazondotcom@search.mozilla.org
Name: Bing Type: extension Version: 1.3 Enabled: true ID: bing@search.mozilla.org
Name: DuckDuckGo Type: extension Version: 1.1 Enabled: true ID: ddg@search.mozilla.org
Name: eBay Type: extension Version: 1.3 Enabled: true ID: ebay@search.mozilla.org
Name: Google Type: extension Version: 1.2 Enabled: true ID: google@search.mozilla.org
Name: Wikipedia (en) Type: extension Version: 1.1 Enabled: true ID: wikipedia@search.mozilla.org
Security Software
Type: AVG Antivirus
Type:
Type: Windows Firewall
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jscher2000 - Support Volunteer said
Thank you for checking that. Policies also can add/remove search engines, so I wanted to see whether that was the explanation. But instead, there's no obvious explanation. In case the program files somehow got corrupted, could you reinstall Firefox using a full (offline) installer. This article has a link to the download page: Custom installation of Firefox on Windows.
I've reinstalled it using the offline installer, it doesn't seem to have changed anything. Still don't have any other search engine options.
You can create a new profile as a quick test to see if your current profile is causing the problem.
See "Creating a profile":
If the new profile works then you can transfer files from a previously used profile to the new profile, but be cautious not to copy corrupted files to avoid carrying over problems.
While I think it should be difficult for external software to modify the search.json.mozlz4 file, because of the compression, there is an add-on that can do it, so it's probably possible for other software to do it if they want to.
To see what is actually in the file, you need to decompress it. I have a tool to decompress the file and generate a basic list of its contents, if you want to try it: