Hello,

Here are some ways to troubleshoot :

1. Refresh Firefox: Go to about:support and click Refresh Firefox to reset settings to default while keeping essential data (like bookmarks, history)
2. Reset Extensions Registry: Close Firefox, navigate to your profile folder, (within file explorer or finder) and delete extensions.json, extensions.ini, extensions.sqlite, and compatibility.ini.
3. Check for Broken/Expired Extensions: Ensure extensions are not on Firefox's blocklist for violating policies or because they are unsigned/unverified.
4. Disable Conflicting Add-ons: Use Troubleshooting Mode (Help > Troubleshoot Mode) to see if a specific extension is causing others to fail.
5. Check Date/Time: Incorrect system date/time can prevent extension verification.
6. Fix Broken Profiles: If extensions still don't work, create a new Firefox profile to rule out corruption in your current one.
7. Check for Expired Root Certificate: If using an older version of Firefox (below 128), an expired root certificate might be disabling add-ons.

@dessertdish,

Thank you, the second step mostly solved the problem. However, the first step not only removed every extension, it completely changed the name of the default profile, and now I can't get it to recognize the old one. How do I get that back? I need the same one, because that's the same profile in the other location. And I don't like this newer name, which is much, much longer. It added a hyphen and a 13 digit number to the profile name, which at least would be identical size to the old one without those extra 14 characters.

I really wish I'd tried the second step first, because then it would be the same profile, and extensions would be back, too.

Thanks again!

Beadmaster, if you type or paste "about:profiles" into the address bar and press enter, is the original profile with the original path listed?

If it is, then you should be able to just press its "Set as default profile" button and Firefox will begin using it from the next time it starts.

If it is not listed, then you can try creating a new profile with a custom path that matches the original profile's path, to register a profile with the desired path. You'd then need to delete the newly created profile folder's contents and replace them with the original folder's contents.

Some more detailed steps for this second option, and please read before attempting anything.

1. Try going to the original profile path in File Explorer
2. If it already exists, then rename it by, for example, appending "_original" to the folder name
3. In Firefox go to about:profiles and press "Create a New Profile"
4. Follow the wizard, making sure to specify a custom path for this new profile that is identical to the original profile's path
5. Make sure that the newly created profile is set as the default profile
6. Fully exit Firefox
7. In File Explorer, delete the contents of the newly created profile folder and replace them with a copy of the contents from the old profile folder that the refresh process placed on the desktop, or a backup of your original profile, or possibly the folder that you might have previously renamed to include "_original". Whichever one you think has the most up-to-date copy of the original profile files (and again, I'd recommend copying rather than moving items in order to have an untouched backup)
8. restart Firefox

If all has worked as it should, Firefox will open with your normal profile data that is located within its normal path on the hard drive.