How to stop Firefox from stealing focus (coming to the foreground)
I often have multiple Firefox instances running with multiple tabs. For some reason, and I cannot find a pattern, Firefox randomly comes to the foreground stealing focus.
I have Googled this issue but cannot find anything current that addresses my problem. I'm running Windows 10, with a clean install. I had this issue before I did a clean install when I was running several other browsers and this issue only happens with Firefox.
This is incredibly irritating behavior as I can be working on a document or in coding when Firefox pops to the foreground. Or I can be in Firefox reading, when another instance pops to the foreground. As much as I prefer Firefox, if I cannot stop this, I'll be uninstalling soon.
Any help would be appreciated.
All Replies (8)
I see I'm not alone with this problem, but no suggestions on how to stop it from happening? I thought Firefox wasn't supposed to do this?
Too bad, I really hoped for a solution. There is one solution that I was hoping to avoid: uninstalling.
I just cannot handle Firefox popping up while I'm TYPING in another window. Just too annoying. Thanks for many great features, but bye.
I think this is an issue with Windows. I have had other windows jump up also.
I don't think this is a windows issue, for me it's only firefox and only second windows that popup to foreground, the primary windows stays in background. This happens in safe mode too.
I already had contact to a website that opens a second window, because i thought they've done this with a script. They told me believable that they don't use such scripts.
This is ultimately annoying, and a really good reason to leave firefox as Rick already did.
After an hour, and four background changes, behavior has stopped using this tip: changing Firefox's browser.tabs.loadDivertedInBackground setting in about:config to true.
Source: First Google search result for "firefox steals focus": Gizmo's Freeware article titled "How To Stop Firefox From Stealing Window Focus", Sep 19, 2011!
Setup: Win 10, 64 Bit, latest Firefox release
febbert said
After an hour, and four background changes, behavior has stopped using this tip: changing Firefox's browser.tabs.loadDivertedInBackground setting in about:config to true. Source: First Google search result for "firefox steals focus": Gizmo's Freeware article titled "How To Stop Firefox From Stealing Window Focus", Sep 19, 2011! Setup: Win 10, 64 Bit, latest Firefox release
Hi bebbert, thanks for the reply. I'll give your suggestion a try and see if it helps.
Good morning Rick,
I hope this solution works out for you. After two days, I am skeptical this solution is working as I expected. I'll update when I know more.
Best to everyone
Frank Ebbert said
Good morning Rick, I hope this solution works out for you.
It took a while, but I can confirm this did NOT solve my problem. But in all fairness to Mozilla, I'm not sure anymore if it is a Mozilla problem. Like @FredMcD, I've also had other windows jump to the foreground, most notiably Windows Explorer. (The problem may just seem like a Mozilla problem since I tend to have so many browsers open at any given time, followed by Window Explorer instances.)
Back to the drawing board.