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

Natao arisiva ity resaka mitohy ity. Mametraha fanontaniana azafady raha mila fanampiana.

How do I make right-click open the context window instead of opening the URL in a new window?

more options

If I happen to single right-click a link, Firefox now immediately opens that link in a new window, instead of opening a context menu first. How can I get back the older functionality that opened a context menu and let me pick, instead of just assuming I meant "open new window"? The context menu may be displaying for a very short period of time before opening the new window, but I'm not sure.

If I happen to single right-click a link, Firefox now immediately opens that link in a new window, instead of opening a context menu first. How can I get back the older functionality that opened a context menu and let me pick, instead of just assuming I meant "open new window"? The context menu may be displaying for a very short period of time before opening the new window, but I'm not sure.

All Replies (9)

more options

Hmm, that shouldn't happen. A few questions:

  • Is this on a particular site that might have special handling for right-clicks, or is it on all sites?
  • Does right-click work normally other than on links, for example, on the background of the page or in an editing area?
  • Could any of your extensions or user scripts be changing how right-click works?
more options
  • Single right-clicking on links in most places brings up the context menu (with "open URL in new window", etc.) for a split-second, then just opens the URL in a new window. Occasionally, it will leave the context menu open long enough for me to choose what to do, but most of the time, it just goes straight for "open in new window".
  • Single right-clicking on other areas brings up the context menu with the back and forward arrows, automatically chooses the back arrow, and moves me back a page.
  • I don't know how to check the third question fully, but most of my extensions are disabled, and I don't think any userscripts are running.
more options

I disabled all my addons, and tried single right-click on "Quote" here. The context menu popped up for a split-second, and then opened it in a new window.

more options

Hmm, if I think about stray keystrokes coming in, they're not consistent.

To activate the back arrow using the keyboard, you would press down arrow then Enter.

To activate Open Link in New Window requires two down arrow presses and then Enter.

What the heck is going on?

I don't suppose you've tried shutting down and restarting your system since this began?

more options

And now... it pops up the context menu, and lets me choose which one. One of the addons may have been slow to disable itself?

Perhaps "Archive URL" Addon could be the culprit, making the menu big enough that sometimes the mouse is over the menu while releasing the button. Still testing.

more options

Well... looks like it's got to be one of the addons. With all of them disabled, context menu appears to be working properly more often.

more options

Still not quite perfect. Some times it still just opens the menu with the cursor over a menu item, and goes straight for that. At least it's now "most of the time it gives me a choice", so it's an improvement.

more options

Easiest method to fix appears to be to toggle ui.context_menus.after_mouseup to true in about:config.

I think this will probably have the drawback of rightclick drag not allowing a choice of menu item, but should make the context menu auto-choice stop happening.

In fact, I'm fairly sure it did, as this time one right-click on "Quote" link here, gave me the context menu with a blue chooser line already over "Open link in new window", but did not automatically go do it. I'm terrible at right-click drag, so this is probably a fair solution.

Novain'i GuardianElm t@

more options

GuardianElm said

Easiest method to fix appears to be to toggle ui.context_menus.after_mouseup to true in about:config.

Interesting. That setting seems related to a difference between Linux and Windows. On Windows, the context menu doesn't appear until after you release the mouse button (what you get by setting true). We can't select a context menu item using right-click-and-hold, move mouse pointer over a menu item, release. It's always a second click for us to activate a context menu item.