I get that dot after I dismiss a drop-down panel notifying me that an update is available. Are you getting the panels? I think they are set to appear either every 24 or every 12 hours by default.

(I use the "Check for updates but let you choose to install them" setting.)

No, I am not getting the panels. Neither for Firefox on my personal computer or my work computer (separate profiles and accounts). I do however get them from one instance of Firefox Portable, but that is the only place I have seen them in recent months.

If the internal updater works when you trigger it using the About Firefox dialog, perhaps there is some kind of long interval set in about:config.

If the internal updater doesn't work, there might be an Enterprise Policy blocking updating. You can type or paste about:policies in the address bar to see what is on the "Active" list, if anything. (Ignore the Documentation list.)

If it's not either of those, hmm, it's hard to think of a reason.

Perhaps it is the interval, as you say. app.update.badgeWaitTime was set to the default of four days (in seconds), which is why I might have thought it never worked.

I tried lowering it to two hours (7200 seconds) and will see what happens when the next update hits. Thank you for the help!