Just to make sure, have you read this document?

Recover lost or missing Bookmarks

Thank you for this information. I have tried everything mentioned and when I try to restore bookmarks using my old firefox data, "bookmarkbackups" file, they are still not there. Am I doing something incorrectly? Or are they stored somewhere else in Firefox?

Could you let us know what you get when you run the "Verify Integrity" function. That's here:

Open Firefox's Troubleshooting Information page using any of these methods:

• "3-bar" menu button > "?" Help > Troubleshooting Information
• (menu bar) Help > Troubleshooting Information
• type or paste about:support in the address bar and press Return

Near the bottom, there is a section titled Places Database -- that's the file which stores history and bookmarks. Click the button labeled Verify Integrity. There may be a 10-15 second delay before results appear.

If all is well, the report that appears below the button should start with:

> Task: checkIntegrity
+ The places.sqlite database is sane
+ The favicons.sqlite database is sane

Does yours say that, or something else? You can select and copy the report, and then paste it into a reply for review and comment.

This is what I got after hitting "verify integrity".

> Task: checkIntegrity + The places.sqlite database is sane + The favicons.sqlite database is sane > Task: invalidateCaches + The caches have been invalidated > Task: checkCoherence + The database is coherent > Task: expire + Database cleaned up > Task: originFrecencyStats + Recalculated origin frecency stats > Task: vacuum + Initial database size is 5120KiB + The database has been vacuumed + Final database size is 5120KiB > Task: stats + Places.sqlite size is 5120KiB + Favicons.sqlite size is 5120KiB + pragma_user_version is 53 + pragma_page_size is 32768 + pragma_cache_size is -2048 + pragma_journal_mode is wal + pragma_synchronous is 1 + History can store a maximum of 39982 unique pages + Table moz_origins has 118 records + Table moz_places has 732 records + Table moz_historyvisits has 1022 records + Table moz_inputhistory has 2 records + Table moz_bookmarks has 12 records + Table moz_bookmarks_deleted has 0 records + Table moz_keywords has 0 records + Table sqlite_sequence has 1 records + Table moz_anno_attributes has 2 records + Table moz_annos has 24 records + Table moz_items_annos has 0 records + Table moz_meta has 8 records + Table sqlite_stat1 has 17 records + Index sqlite_autoindex_moz_origins_1 + Index sqlite_autoindex_moz_inputhistory_1 + Index sqlite_autoindex_moz_bookmarks_deleted_1 + Index sqlite_autoindex_moz_keywords_1 + Index sqlite_autoindex_moz_anno_attributes_1 + Index moz_places_url_hashindex + Index moz_places_hostindex + Index moz_places_visitcount + Index moz_places_frecencyindex + Index moz_places_lastvisitdateindex + Index moz_places_guid_uniqueindex + Index moz_places_originidindex + Index moz_historyvisits_placedateindex + Index moz_historyvisits_fromindex + Index moz_historyvisits_dateindex + Index moz_bookmarks_itemindex + Index moz_bookmarks_parentindex + Index moz_bookmarks_itemlastmodifiedindex + Index moz_bookmarks_dateaddedindex + Index moz_bookmarks_guid_uniqueindex + Index moz_keywords_placepostdata_uniqueindex + Index moz_annos_placeattributeindex + Index moz_items_annos_itemattributeindex > Task: _refreshUI

Thanks, that all sounds good, so it's a mystery to me why the bookmark backup file won't restore.

Just to review what you're doing:

(A) Open the Library window (Command+Shift+b)

(B) On the Import and Backup menu (icon may be a star with circling arrows, or up and down arrows). click Restore

• If an earlier date is available, pick it from the menu and see whether it gets restored.

• If no earlier date is available, click Choose File and point Firefox to the Old Firefox Data folder, into your old profile folder, into the bookmarkbackups folder, and load one of the dated backups. The file name has the number of items (bookmarks + folders) coded into it. For example, 425 in this case:
  
  bookmarks-2020-08-29_425_gibberish==.jsonlz4

After that, the old bookmarks don't show up?

Correct. No bookmarks show up after doing what you said above. Are they gone?

I have a tool that converts a .jsonlz4 backup file to an HTML-format "export" file. This allows you to see what is in the file, and then you also can use the bookmark "Import" feature to see whether that works better than the "Restore" feature.

Here's the page:

https://www.jeffersonscher.com/ffu/bookbackreader.html

After dropping your .jsonlz4 file on the page, click Export HTML. You can save the file anywhere convenient.

This is a real shot in the dark.

Do you use Time Machine to create backups? If so, you could try restoring the Old Firefox Data folder from a backup prior to the date you reinstalled Firefox and then perform the recovery instructions again. I have no idea if this will work never having tried it.

Does this make sense, Jscher2000?

Hi OBW47, as a Windows user, I'm not sure what Time Machine stores.

What I get when I do the Export HTML is:

Help and Tutorials Customize Firefox Get Involved About Us

Also:

Getting Started

Hmm, that sound like a conversion of a fresh new file. If you check your Old Firefox Data folder again, can you find one old enough to be from before the change, and how many items does it says it contains?

Time Machine creates a complete backup of a Mac’s hard drive including multiple daily versions