Firefox Community Forum

This afternoon, I clicked on a link from an email and for the first time got a choose a profile pop-up. I do not want this; I have read info on Mozilla and elsewhere about its purpose but it doesn't say how to just stop the pop-up - there should be an option just stop the pop-up because I don;t want to have to choose amongst options. I have started copy-pasting the links in emails and going to Chrome and will seriously have to reconsider using Firefox of this continues. I don't want to have to type about:config or anything - this should have been an opt out or opt in thing and I want out. Thank you for your help.

My toolbar disappeared in January very disappointed because I don't want to take my computer to the fix it man here in town when It was not something I did but rather came with an update.

I have used Firefox for years, both out of conviction and to help protect my privacy, even though I often put up with images and forms not displaying on web pages.

Then, three times in two months, after restarting Firefox, I found all my tabs, bookmarks and browser history had disappeared. The only thing I did between restarts was to run Wise Care 365 to clear some space on my laptop, something I had done hundreds of times before.

The first time the loss occurred I found I had a new profile, a feature I neither wanted nor was consulted about. At least I was able to get back to my original profile. The next two times this proved impossible.

Firefox "support" was of no use. Multiple searches produced nothing which helped. After agonising hours, I was able to retrieve my bookmarks and my Firefox browser history through Microsoft Edge. But as a writer and (award-winning) journalist I cannot afford to risk losing my research and links.

So although I disapprove of some Microsoft business practices. I am moving to Edge. If I have missed something that makes sense of this, I would be pleased to hear it. In the meantime, Mozilla needs to improve its product and customer service.

Wishing its customers well,

Francis Shennan

I have created two profiles using the new functionality that is accessed using the "hamburger" or three horizontal lines menu. I want to open one profile at times, but the other at different times. I can only specify a default profile for initial browser start, or to have the browser make me choose each time. Either of these options mean that I have to go through extra steps to launch any profile beside the default. This effectively makes the new profiles less useful to me than the profile manager that has been around for much longer.

Searching for help online has led me to several suggestions to create shortcuts that use the -P "profile name" switch for each profile. This is out of date because the profiles I can access from the command line bear no connection to the ones I have created as described in the above paragraph. They are only the ones I have created using the (old) profile manager from the profile manager in about:settings.

Did I miss something, in other words is it possible to do something similar with the new container profiles as I can with the original config profiles?

Hello,

I have a personal profile and a work profile on Firefox.

Both profiles have a short cut on the desktop to their webmails. At present when I double click either of the shortcuts, Firefox starts and presents the Windows to select the profile to use.

Is there some way to specify in each shortcut which profile it should use to open the webmail?

Thanks Neeraj

I was positively surprised recently when the new Firefox profile manager (about:profilemanager) was introduced. https://www.tech2geek.net/how-to-use-the-new-updated-profile-manager-in-firefox-2025/ is an article about that.

However, I thought it's just a new visual UI with an in-browser switcher for the existing profiles (that I already had setup). However, it does not appear so.

The differences I see:

1. 1. 1. old profile management

• was managed by `about:profiles` or when starting FIrefox with `-P`
• is saved in `~/firefox` and the `profiles.ini` clearly and quite obviously mentions them there, so it's easy to manage them.

I also found this old support article: https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/profile-manager-create-remove-switch-firefox-profiles

1. 1. 1. new profile management

• automatically asks on startup if more than one profile exists
• is managed by `about:profilemanager` or with the Firefox burger menu
• seems to be saved in `~/.mozilla/firefox/Profile Groups` (Linux path here) in some .sqlite files, and I do not quite understand the format. Not mentioned in `profiles.ini`.
• also, when you change something here (even like opening a profile?), you cannot open `about:profiles` anymore, because it says "Some Firefox process has made changes to your profile, […] you need to restart Firefox", only after a restart further changes would be possible, which I find quite confusing but it also indicates somehow the features belong together?

And this seems to be the new one: https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/profile-management#w_whats-the-difference-between-profiles-and-multi-account-containers

1. 1. Questions

• What are the differences here (I may have missed)?
• How can the new profile feature save so few files? Is it technically called "profile groups"?
• And the most important: How can I migrate an old profile? (In order to use the new features and GUI etc. I quite like)

I went through the process of importing all of my old profiles into the new profile manager and I, for one, am stoked that we are joining the big leagues with regards to profile management. This has been a feature that I have been waiting for for quite some time now. I have an extension that allows me to easily switch between the old profiles but a proper, built in solution was necessary.

That is until I launched Firefox the next day and was greeted with my work profile instead of my personal profile. I started digging through the settings and it seems that this is the intended default behavior for profiles. The last profile you had open is the profile that will open by default.

It's fine if the developers want that to be the default but what I also find strange is that I cannot, for the life of me, find a way to change this behavior on Windows. I found it on Linux (I think??) but I dont see a flag for it in the usual places. Maybe I missed it. That is why I am here.

1.) Is there a way to change this default behavior for the new profile manager? 2.) If not, can we plan to add that feature? Currently, this behavior makes the new profile system unusable for me because I need my browser to open to my personal profile when I open a new window.

Yes, I'd like to use the same account on both of my profiles.

I understand that for some users, this may be confusing.

In my case, the only reason for different profiles is that I need to use a Proxy Server for some websites, and no proxy for other websites. Manually switching proxy settings is painful, and doing so causes traffic for my other tabs/windows to go to the proxy, which I do not want.

I have a main (set of) windows (and its tabs) going straight to the internet, then I have a separate window (and its tabs) configured to go through a proxy (SOCKS5 in this case). I want all other settings, bookmarks, passwords, etc. to be identical to both. I end up having to logout of my main profile, log into the other profile to sync settings, log out of there, and log back into my main profile.

Is there a valid technical reason why an account on the same FireFox installation cannot be shared between two profiles?

I can do this on multiple computers (same account, different computers/profile), seems odd it is restricted to not allow on the same computer.

I have an alternative solution: Install FireFox natively, then install FireFox as AUR or FlatPak, but not sure this will collide as this both uses the same profile directory. Hum...

Wayne

Unimportant and mildly disruptive issue: I've been using the about:profiles method to maintain separate profiles. I am aware that this is distinct from the new way to manage profiles (about:profilemanager; https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/questions/1543697 ).

I normally use my default profile (let's call it profile A) to open other profiles (of which there are 6 + a Nightly profile).

However, recently I've noticed that if I open another profile (B) from profile A: Refreshing profile A's about:profiles makes it inactive, with the "Another copy of Firefox has made changes to profiles" error. Now, B's about:profiles correctly displays the different profiles, and I can launch more profiles from here. But A is still shown as the default profile. I've tried this with a few other profiles (C, D), but even with those open, B still seems to have the functional about:profiles page.

Is there any way to reset this, i.e. to make A's about:profiles functional even when profile B is launched?

Edit: I think this is because profile B has the new profile manager enabled, and under this, B is the original profile. I tried setting browser.profiles.enabled to false in the about:config settings but this doesn't seem to help. Oh well!

I wish Firefox would realize that when working on this machine I am at work and my laptop is personal. I now have too many work things registered under my personal email. I am considering no longer using FireFox because the browser can't seem to be cognizant of work vs. personal.

Good day,

I'd like to start by thanking the Mozilla Firefox dev team for the newest iteration of the profiles feature. I think it's great.

One area where I think it could use improvement from usability perspective is a way to launch a specific profile via the right-click menu when using the taskbar icon. Currently, using the "Choose a profile when Firefox opens" only gives users the option to select the profile on the initial launch of Firefox. After that if the user opens a new window via the taskbar, the most recently opened profile is automatically chosen.

I managed to find a "hack" to add the requested capability. It seems adding an action to the "firefox.desktop" file in the "/usr/share/applications/" directory works the way I'd like it to.

Modifications to "firefox.desktop" Changed line 12 to: Actions=choose-profile;new-window;new-private-window;open-profile-manager; Added lines 529 - 534 (before Desktop Action new-window): [Desktop Action choose-profile] Exec=firefox --new-instance Name=Choose Profile Name[en_US]=Choose Profile Name[en_CA]=Choose Profile Name[en_GB]=Choose Profile

The end result is a new option available when right clicking the taskbar that opens the new profile selector. Screencaps of options before and after attached. I imagine that users will need to have the "Choose a profile when Firefox opens" enabled for this to work as expected, but would like someone from Mozilla to confirm this.

Would like to request that this option be built into Firefox going forward, so there's no need for users to "tweak" it to get this functionality.

I give up. All I want to do is to go to the selected web site. Now different profile. Passwords don't work. Too frustrating. I had to switch to edge because I just could not figure out why I was getting jerked around.

I have a profile that I had copied from my main profile, which is connected to an email and synced. This second profile is unsynced, and it won't let me sign into my account because that account is connected to the main profile. It says I need a separate account for a separate profile. Fair enough. I try to make an account. It says I cannot sign in to the new account because the profile is synced to the old one. Very annoying to be given instructions that don't work. So, I make a new profile and sign in to my new account on it. It works. But now I don't have my bookmarks and passwords. So I find instructions on backing up my account and copy my secondary profile into the new profile with the new account. It logs me out and is now giving me the same error! (the backup was successful though) I don't want to have to copy and paste all of my passwords and things into a new account. Is there any way to make my secondary profile syncable?

Firrst off, I find I must be learning disabled when it comes to Firefox! I already mentioned the topic above, and someone emailed 2x from the f.f "Team" and wrote helpful info on WHY I might have gotten this red flag-still ain't sure right now, and last n. I tried the question in terms of the white flower.

  I got an auto info reply which matches what appears to be two profiles..there's one ff. on left with white flower, and 2nd on r. in mac dock with a heart!
  The 2nd, newer profile on r MUST be the new one it forced me to creat....

to me, this is like the scene in Star Wars when Luke Skywalker looks up at the two moons of Endor...unlike him, I am terrified to delete 2nd/neweer/heart account (which I created Thurs. night "mac 13"...b/c when it was created, it didn't have my bookmarks and p/w and I could NOT get the p/w s. and STILL can't import them back to classic/original profiel!!!!!!

The profile issue is thus 1) fear to delete 2nd newer "forced" profile, and 2nd is again, NO bookmarks in original once it forced me to make a 2nd profile.

The steps to get bookmarks are incredibly complicated...I DON"T KNOW WHY they were pushed out of the original, BUT HAVEN'T GOT ANY IN ALL PROFILE/SETTINGS/SAVED P/W'S I wasted Apple support help x 1 hr., and they have limits b/c 3rd party. Mac inro'd a "passords" feature in apps but there is no file (three letter --- type to reimport, I guess b/c they weren't in icloud-am not sure)!

  Where oh where have my p/w's gone...am I forced to go to another of my four macs and see if they're gone there too..I think so..haven't even checked the phone...UB HOW TO TYPE IN ALL P/W'S AGAIN MANUALLY IS A DRAG-AND THE INSTRUCTION SETS ON FIREFOX ARE OVERWHEMINGLY DIFFICULT!

I’m running into a limitation with Firefox profiles involving the original Profile Manager (about:profiles) and the new Profiles menu in the toolbar.

I previously created multiple profiles using the original Profile Manager (about:profiles), for example profiles A, B, and C. These profiles still function normally and can be launched through about:profiles, but they do not appear in the new Profiles menu in the toolbar.

I also tried using the “Copy this profile” option available from the new Profiles menu. This made it clear that the feature does not work with profiles created via about:profiles. For example, when I open profile A, I expected that I could use “Copy this profile” to copy profile A into an existing profile like profile B (which was also created using about:profiles). However, this is not possible. Profiles A, B, and C remain isolated from the new Profiles menu and cannot be accessed, copied, or managed through it.

At the moment, profiles created with the original Profile Manager (about:profiles) can only be accessed through that manager and cannot be transferred into the new Profiles menu in the toolbar.

Is there an official fix or a workaround that achieves the same result—specifically, transferring or integrating all existing profiles created with the original Profile Manager (about:profiles) into the new Profiles menu accessible from the Firefox toolbar?

I am currently using FF v133.0 and I want to downgrade to v130.0. I tried this once before and could not get the 'Profile' to activate and reinstall all of my settings, bookmarks, add-ons, etc.

Please provide step-by-step instructions for doing this. Any assistance will be greatly appreciated.

I am using Windows 10 64 bit.

Thank you.