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

how do i open a new tab and its automatically opens to my home page

  • 3 replies
  • 10 have this problem
  • 1 view
  • Last reply by labrat2040

more options

when i open a new tab it goes straight to snapdo.com. how do i change this so when i open a new tab it opens straight to google without having to type it in or clicking a bookmark button?

when i open a new tab it goes straight to snapdo.com. how do i change this so when i open a new tab it opens straight to google without having to type it in or clicking a bookmark button?

Chosen solution

There is a hidden setting for new tabs...

(1) In a new tab, type or paste about:config in the address bar and press Enter. Click the button promising to be careful.

(2) In the search box above the list, type or paste newtab and pause while the list is filtered

(3) Double-click the browser.newtab.url preference and enter your preferred page:

  • Page thumbnails (default) => about:newtab
  • Blank tab => about:blank
  • Built-in Firefox home page => about:home
  • Any other page => full URL to the page

Note: when changing it to Google, use a complete ultimate URL such as https://www.google.com/ -- if you use a partial URL, there will be a brief delay while Google redirects Firefox to that ultimate URL.

Press Ctrl+t to open a new tab and verify that it worked. Fixed?

Two gotchas:

  • If Firefox ignores the setting, one of your extensions may be overriding it. You can review, disable, and/or remove extensions on the add-ons page:

    Tools menu > Add-ons > in the left column click Extensions
  • If the change works but at the next startup is back to Google, you might have a user.js file in your personal Firefox settings folder (your Firefox profile folder). This article describes how to track down and remove the file: How to fix preferences that won't save.

Any luck?

Read this answer in context 👍 30

All Replies (3)

more options

Chosen Solution

There is a hidden setting for new tabs...

(1) In a new tab, type or paste about:config in the address bar and press Enter. Click the button promising to be careful.

(2) In the search box above the list, type or paste newtab and pause while the list is filtered

(3) Double-click the browser.newtab.url preference and enter your preferred page:

  • Page thumbnails (default) => about:newtab
  • Blank tab => about:blank
  • Built-in Firefox home page => about:home
  • Any other page => full URL to the page

Note: when changing it to Google, use a complete ultimate URL such as https://www.google.com/ -- if you use a partial URL, there will be a brief delay while Google redirects Firefox to that ultimate URL.

Press Ctrl+t to open a new tab and verify that it worked. Fixed?

Two gotchas:

  • If Firefox ignores the setting, one of your extensions may be overriding it. You can review, disable, and/or remove extensions on the add-ons page:

    Tools menu > Add-ons > in the left column click Extensions
  • If the change works but at the next startup is back to Google, you might have a user.js file in your personal Firefox settings folder (your Firefox profile folder). This article describes how to track down and remove the file: How to fix preferences that won't save.

Any luck?

more options

This might not be the same for everyone but I noticed that at the bottom of the search page I was trying to get rid of there was a link titled 'reset tab settings to normal' then I was prompted by a dialog window to change the default tab. this worked for me.

more options

This worked perfectly. Thanks!