Mozilla Firefox is an extremely popular web browser that is used by millions of internets users worldwide. Users are lured to Mozilla Firefox due to it’s vast customization options and fast speed. Some say that Firefox is faster than Google Chrome, but this is subjective. Most users won’t notice the difference.
Sometimes, Mozilla Firefox (or any internet browser for that matter) will run poorly. The browser can hang, have slow page load times, slow switching between tabs, slow startup times, and random crashes.
These issues are incredibly annoying. If you are a heavy user of Mozilla Firefox, they’ll become too much to handle extremely quick. This guide is meant to provide you with some tips to help make Firefox run faster. We will go over some basic adjustments to Firefox’s settings to help speed up your browser.
Tips to make Firefox run faster
These tips are some fast adjustments that should help speed up Firefox.
Refresh Firefox
Refreshing your browser is one of the fastest and easiest ways to make Firefox faster. The refresh command will bring most of Firefox’s settings back to their default. When you refresh Firefox, the profile folder will be backed up and retain the following information
- Browser history
- Bookmarks
- Saved passwords
- Auto-fills
- Cookies
When refreshing Mozilla Firefox, the following will be deleted.
- Themes
- Extensions
- Plugins
- Website permissions
- Download history
- Social features
How to refresh firefox
To refresh firefox, open the browser and type in about:support. Then just simply click on the button titled Refresh Firefox.
An alternative way to refresh Firefox would be to go to Firefox.com. You’ll immediately be greeted by a large Refresh button. Please note that you must have the latest version of Mozilla Firefox installed for this to work.
Clear your browser’s history
A good practice is to clear your browser history once a week. If you let the history build up for too long, your browser will run slow and begin to hang up at times. You should clear your cache and cookies, and this should help speed up Firefox.
How to clear browser history in Firefox
Clearing your browser history is extremely simple in Firefox. On the top menu bar, click History, then click “Clear recent history” > Select everything > and click “Clear now”.
HTTP Pipelining
Pipelining is a simple tweak that you can do to make Firefox run faster. by enabling this feature, you are allowing Firefox to send multiple HTTP requests when attempting to connect to website. This will improve the speed in which Firefox loads web pages.
How to enable HTTP pipelining in Firefox
Enabling pipelining in Firefox is easy.
Type about:config into the URL bar and press enter
Next you’ll see a warning screen. Click accept
After accepting the warning, you’ll see the configuration area with a search bar at the top.
In the search bar type: network.http.pipelining and press enter
Look towards the right and you’ll see the value is set to ‘false’. Double click on it to change the value to ‘true’. This enables HTTP Pipelining.
Enable cache
Enabling HTTP cache in Mozilla Firefox will help alleviate user interface sluggishness.
How to enable cache in Firefox
Enabling the cache in Firefox is similar to the other methods listed above. Here are the steps below:
- Type about:config into the URL bar and press enter
- In the search, type browser.cache.use_new_backend
- It will be set to zero. Double click on it to change the setting to 1
Other methods to try
You could do all of the above steps, and still find yourself frustrated with a slow Firefox browser. These last few methods may be what it takes.
Browse in safe mode
Using the built in safe mode in Firefox is a good way to determine if a theme or plugin is the culprit that is causing sluggishness or slow load times. When you browse the web in safe mode, all browser settings remain the same. The only difference is that themes and plugins are disabled. If you notice an immediate increase in performance, that means a plugin is probably causing you these problems.
Third party ad blocker
Advertisements are common on many websites today, but sometimes they go a little overboard. Too many ads will slow page load times. A solution to this problem could be a plugin such as Adblock Plus. This plugin blocks web advertisements preventing them from loading. It’s a quick and simple way to make Firefox faster.
If all else fails
These tips listed above are common solutions to slow page load times in Firefox. In 99% of scenarios, you’ll see instant results. If after implementing these methods to speed up Firefox you are still experiencing difficulties, it may be best to simply try uninstalling Firefox and loading a fresh install. This may just be what it takes.
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