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restore previous session doesn't work

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Every time Firefox crashes or I end the session when I reopen firefox the "Restore Previous Session" does not come up in the tab it just gives me a blank "New Tab" and the 3 bar "Restore Previous Session" is greyed out. I have gone through the solutions on the Restore Previous Session page but none of them helped and I have selected that Firefox should bring up Restore Previous Session but it just doesn't. I have only had this problem after I had updated recently to the firefox quantum 58.0.2 (64-bit) before the update I never had this issue.

Every time Firefox crashes or I end the session when I reopen firefox the "Restore Previous Session" does not come up in the tab it just gives me a blank "New Tab" and the 3 bar "Restore Previous Session" is greyed out. I have gone through the solutions on the Restore Previous Session page but none of them helped and I have selected that Firefox should bring up Restore Previous Session but it just doesn't. I have only had this problem after I had updated recently to the firefox quantum 58.0.2 (64-bit) before the update I never had this issue.

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by 3 bar I mean the menu drop down options the Restore Previous Session is greyed out

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Means that in a crash everything is lost. Did you also check your History settings to be sure none of the options boxes were checked as well? If they are that will also clear any sessions and histories and tabs as well.

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yes I checked the options boxes that's one of the first things the Restore Previous Sessions help page suggests I check.

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Make sure you do not run Firefox in permanent Private Browsing mode (Always use Private Browsing mode; Never Remember History).

  • Options/Preferences -> Privacy & Security -> Firefox will: "Use custom settings for history"
  • remove checkmark: [ ] "Always use Private Browsing mode"

Try the "Show my windows and tabs from last time" startup setting because that is more reliable then the other startup settings.

Do you see the normal files in the sessionstore-backups folder?

Firefox uses the sessionstore.jsonlz4 file in the profile folder to store session data. The sessionstore.jsonlz4 file is only present when Firefox is closed. The sessionstore.jsonlz4 file is created from recovery.jsonlz4 when you close Firefox and is removed and copied to previous.jsonlz4 when you start Firefox to make is possible to restore the session at any time.

You will normally find these files in the sessionstore-backups folder:

  • previous.jsonlz4 (cleanBackup: copy of sessionstore.jsonlz4 from previous session that was loaded successfully)
  • recovery.jsonlz4 (latest version of sessionstore.jsonlz4 written during runtime)
  • recovery.baklz4 (previous version of sessionstore.jsonlz4 written during runtime)
  • upgrade.jsonlz4-<build_id> (backup created during an upgrade of Firefox)

You can copy a file from the sessionstore-backups folder to the main profile and rename the file to sessionstore.jsonlz4 to replace the current file (make sure to backup the current sessionstore.jsonlz4).

Firefox 56+ releases compress the files in the sessionstore-backups folder and sessionstore.jsonlz4 with LZ4 (.jsonlz4 instead of .js), so it is no longer easy to inspect them.

See also: