Firefox users can make their browsing experience more enjoyable by tweaking a few about:config settings. Here are a few to get you started:

  1. Enable Firefox’s Private Browsing feature. This will keep your browsing history private and anonymous, preventing others from tracking your activity online. To enable Private Browsing, open Firefox’s about:config page (press Ctrl+O (Windows) or Command+O (Mac) to open the about:config page), and set the privacy.privatebrowsing.enabled preference to true.
  2. Change Firefox’s default search engine. If you want to use a different search engine than the one Firefox defaulted to, you can change it in about:config by setting the browser.search_engine_url preference to the URL of your preferred search engine. For example, if you want to use Google as your default search engine, set browser.search_engine_url=http://www.google.com/.
  3. Disable WebRTC audio and video sharing in Firefox for improved privacy and security . WebRTC is a technology that allows browsers to share audio and video data with each other without having to use third-party plugins or extensions . By disabling WebRTC in Firefox, you will reduce the risk of your personal information being shared with unintended parties . To disable WebRTC audio and video sharing in Firefox, open Firefox’s about:config page (press Ctrl+O (Windows) or Command+O (Mac) to open the about:config page), and set the media .webrtc .enabled preference to false . ..

Backup about:config Settings

To find the Firefox profile folder on your computer, open a command prompt and type “firefox” followed by the path to your Firefox profile folder. For example, if you are on Windows, you would type “C:\Users\username\AppData\Roaming\Firefox”.

Then, click on the “General” tab. Scroll down to the “Web Browser” section and click on the “Default Browser” button. Select Google Chrome as your default browser. ..

This will take you to a question-and-answer page on the website of the company that made your phone.

Another menu will pop up and here you have to click on Troubleshooting Information to get help.

If you click on that button, Firefox will open your profile folder and show all the files and folders inside it. ..

When you click the button, it will open Firefox to the current Explorer profile. Now just browse down till you see prefs.js and copy that file to another location on your hard drive. ..

Modify the about:config Configuration in Firefox

If you’re not sure how to change some of the advanced Firefox configuration settings, it might be a good idea to take a look at Mozilla’s documentation on the subject. The documentation can be found at about:config.

To change a value for a key in your browser, simply enter its name into the Search textbox at the top. Double click on the entry and you can change the value in the popup box. Restart your browser and the changes will take effect. ..

  1. Change the graphics settings to medium or high.
  2. Change the video quality to high or medium.
  3. Change the frame rate to a higher value if you can.
  4. Disable anti-aliasing on your graphics card if you don’t want it on your screen.
  5. Disable motion blur on your graphics card if you don’t want it on your screen.

Open Search Results in New Tab

This tweak is pretty cool and one of the best out there. Basically, when you perform a search from the search box at the top right in Firefox, it normally loads in the current tab. However, if you set the value of this setting to TRUE instead of FALSE, then every time you perform a search, a new tab will come up with the results, thereby leaving your current tab alone! ..

I have to manually open a new tab to search because I’m almost always on the go and accidentally overwrite what I was viewing.

False – The default value for the “tabs” property is False. To load results in a new tab, set the property to True.

Just a quick note before we move on: You’ll notice that once you change a value from the default, it will turn bold and the status will be changed to user set. You can sort on that column and quickly find all the settings you have changed. You can also just right-click on any of those settings and click Reset to set it back to the default value.

Open New Tabs at End

If you want the new tab to open at the end of all the tabs, change the value below to False. ..

False – Load new tab at the end of all tabs

Disable Delay When Installing Add-ons

I’m not sure why Firefox takes so long to install add-ons, but it’s really frustrating for someone who knows what they’re doing. If you just want to install an add-on without being hassled by Firefox’s slow process, you can disable it by setting the value to 0.

The 1000 default value for the delay setting is 0. This means that the delay setting is not affected by the user’s choice.

Preview Tabs When Switching

If you like how you can see previews when you switch between programs in Windows when using ALT + TAB, then you will definitely want to enable previews in Firefox. In Firefox, you’ll get a little popup window in the center with a thumbnail for each open tab.

False – Default value, set to false to not view previews

Disable Prefetch of Webpages

Firefox tries to download links on pages for you so that it can load them faster. If you set the value to false, Firefox won’t try to do this.

False – Do not set the default value for this property.

Increase Network Performance

  1. Use a network cable that is properly terminated.
  2. Use a router with an Ethernet port.
  3. Use a firewall to protect your computer from unauthorized access.

Firefox will make 256 simultaneous network connections to any number of Web servers. If you have that value, leave it as is. If you are running an older version of Firefox and the value is 8 or 30 or something like that, you can increase it all the way up to 256. ..

The network.http.max-persistent-connections-per-server setting controls the maximum number of persistent connections that can be established on a server. The default is 6, but this value can be increased to 1 or 2 if desired. If you exceed this value, Firefox may refuse to allow additional connections.

Turn Off ToolTips

To get rid of all the tool tips that pop up every time you hover your mouse over a button, you can change the config file. Personally, I already know what every single button on my toolbar does and it annoys me when they pop up and cover something else!

False – Do not turn on tooltips

Some people are unhappy with the fact that it won’t pop up a tooltip when you hover over the title of a tab. If you sometimes hover over a tab to see the full title of the webpage, then setting this to false will prevent you from seeing that info.

Firefox tweaks are a great way to customize your browser for the better. Here are seven of my favorite Firefox tweaks that I use on a daily basis. Feel free to add your own favorite about:config tweak in the comments.