The internet has long ago become crucial for people no matter what they need to do. From working and studying to exploring the world and having fun, the online world has it all just a few clicks and keyboard strokes away. Since it is so beneficial and useful for our species, it is almost exclusively a huge deal when there is some kind of a problem with our connection or another internet-related issue that prevents us from hopping online.
Troubles in Paradise
There is nothing as annoying as setting up your computer to start working, only for your Mozilla Firefox internet browser to crashes out of nowhere and set you back right from the start! What is more, imagine a scenario in which you want to relax after you have had a long day at school and cannot wait to stream your favorite soap opera episode, only for your browser to crash. Instead of waiting for your ever-busy brother to fix it for you, or spend hours searching for an alternative, why not try and figure things out by yourself? Trust us, it is not nearly as hard as you believe. This article will help you troubleshoot and find solutions to the problem. By the time you are done, you will wonder why you were ever worried about something this simple in the first place.
What Makes Mozilla Firefox Crash?
Before we can begin to solve the problem, we must first define it and better understand the basics that surround it. A crash occurs when Firefox closes unexpectedly, exactly as the message you usually get states. After your browser crashes, you will receive a Mozilla Crash Reporter. To start you off, you will have to figure out when exactly Mozilla Firefox crashes. Does it happen on start-up or later on? Does Firefox refuse to start altogether but issues you a crash report instead, or does some kind of activity on your end cause the crash like a specific website or action? Answering these questions will help us quickly narrow down to the root of the problem at hand.
There are numerous reasons why Mozilla Firefox, one of the most popular internet browsers in the world, keeps crashing for you. The section below will address some of the common causes and provide you with appropriate solutions.
Firefox Crashes During Start-Up
Say, for instance, that Mozilla crashes every time you launch it. How can you prevent the crash from happening again if you cannot even open the program? The first thing you should do is to try to start Firefox using the Safe Mode option. To do this, hold down the Shift key while starting Firefox. This is a unique way of starting up the browser by temporarily turning off some hardware settings and disabling extensions that could prevent Firefox from launching. If Firefox starts, then the problem lies with an extension, a theme, or come hardware acceleration issue.
If Firefox does not stop crashing, even in Safe Mode, the next best thing is to perform a clean installation. This process entails uninstalling Firefox from your machine by deleting the installation folder. Make sure you have deleted everything Firefox related from the computer as well. Once done, download Firefox one more time and carefully follow the usual prompts to reinstall it. It is vital to note that you will not lose your saved bookmarks and passwords during the uninstallation process unless you choose to do it.
In other cases, it may be another program making your browser crash. With that being said, you will have to check your machine and remove the culprit malware. To do so, you will need to run your antivirus to scan the system in its entirety and remove the software that plagues it.
Firefox Does Not Start at All
If you keep seeing the Mozilla Crash Reporter whenever you start Firefox, it is probably time to update your software. You are probably not the only person experiencing this problem. In addition, this is why programmers include several fixes for crashes alongside every single brand new Firefox release, as well as every single update. Therefore, your issue will likely disappear as soon as you update your browser to the newest edition available online.
On other occasions, it could be that you are yet to update Windows and internet security software. On the other hand, maybe some of your drivers could be outdated. That said, you would need to confirm that your graphics drivers and other related software are all up to date as you never know what could be messing with the browser. This is why it is always important to update your apps and programs as soon as possible.
Other Things You Can Try
If no solutions mentioned above prove fruitful, you should consider the following viable remedies before throwing in the towel.
- Clear your browser cache
A corrupt cache that has not been dealt with in months will make anything crash, let alone a browser that constantly runs information on the web like Mozilla Firefox. To eliminate this error, you will need to clear your recent history and all of the data that the program has to store in order to properly navigate the internet.
- Refresh Mozilla Firefox
You can also try refreshing your browser and returning everything to default settings. After all, the smallest ideas can give the best results sometimes, and it can never hurt to try this as one of the last resorts.
Final Thoughts
If Firefox keeps crashing even after trying the above solutions and you are open to doing some detective work, try to troubleshoot the issue on the web using the message you get, or through another browser, just until you find the solution. You will receive a detailed report listing information about the crash. Do not be surprised to find that you could have accidentally disabled JavaScript. It is an essential piece of the modern browsing puzzle and it tends to happen to people. Visit enablejavascript.io to learn how to enable it in Mozilla Firefox and make sure to keep it updated and on at all times to prevent future issues.
