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Create a new Mozilla Firefox Profile

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Why would I want to create a new Firefox profile?

I'm concerned that my settings may be corrupt in Firefox, or need to troubleshoot an issue that is occurring in Firefox. How do I create a new Firefox profile?

Note: Your new Firefox profile will not contain the same bookmarks as your old profile, but they will not be lost. For instructions on how to migrate your bookmarks to the new profile, see "How can I import my bookmarks to the new profile?" below.

Windows

See Creating a new Firefox profile on Windows for a step by step guide with screenshots, or follow these instructions:

  1. Close Firefox completely (select File > Exit from the main menu of Firefox). Make sure that Firefox is not running in the background. If needed, you can restart Windows.
  2. Select Start > Run... from the Windows Start menu (use the search box on Vista).
  3. Enter
    firefox.exe -ProfileManager \\ or firefox.exe -p
  4. Press OK.
  5. Press New to create the new profile.
  6. If you're accessing certificate protected sites, you'll need to obtain MIT certificates for the new profile.
    • Navigate in Firefox to http://ca.mit.edu
    • Enter your Kerberos username, MIT ID and password, and follow the prompts.
    • In Step III, Final Steps, be sure to select MIT Certificate Authority, then select "Trust this CA to identify websites" and press OK.
  7. NOTE: Lincoln Laboratory users should follow instructions here: http://kb.mit.edu/confluence/x/eAdt

Macintosh

  1. Close Firefox completely and make sure that it is not running in the background.
  2. Launch Terminal ("Applications -> Utilities -> Terminal").
  3. Enter the following command at the Terminal prompt (assuming that Firefox is installed in the Applications folder):
    /Applications/firefox.app/Contents/MacOS/firefox -profilemanager
    
  4. If the above command doesn't work, try again, but include -bin:
    /Applications/firefox.app/Contents/MacOS/firefox-bin -profilemanager
    
  5. If you're accessing certificate protected sites, you'll need to obtain MIT certificates for the new profile.
    • Navigate in Firefox to http://ca.mit.edu
    • Enter your Kerberos username, MIT ID and password, and follow the prompts.
    • In Step III, Final Steps, be sure to select MIT Certificate Authority, then select "Trust this CA to identify websites" and press OK.
  6. NOTE: Lincoln Laboratory users should follow instructions here: http://kb.mit.edu/confluence/x/eAdt

Linux

  1. Close the application completely and make sure that it is not running in the background.
  2. Open the terminal and execute cd (program directory) then execute:
    ./firefox -profilemanager
    
  3. Alternately, in a terminal type
    path/to/application -profilemanager
    
  4. If you're accessing certificate protected sites, you'll need to obtain MIT certificates for the new profile.
    • Navigate in Firefox to http://ca.mit.edu
    • Enter your Kerberos username, MIT ID and password, and follow the prompts.
    • In Step III, Final Steps, be sure to select MIT Certificate Authority, then select "Trust this CA to identify websites" and press OK.
  5. NOTE: Lincoln Laboratory users should follow instructions here: http://kb.mit.edu/confluence/x/eAdt

How can I import my bookmarks to the new profile?

  • Export bookmarks from your old Firefox profile
    • From Firefox Profile Manager, choose to launch the old profile.
    • Follow the menu path Bookmarks >> Show All Bookmarks >> Export bookmarks to HTML
      Result: A file named bookmarks.html will be created in the location of your choice, such as on the Desktop.
  • Import bookmarks to your new Firefox profile
    • From Firefox Profile Manager, choose to launch the new profile.
    • Follow the menu path Bookmarks >> Show All Bookmarks >> Import bookmarks from HTML
    • Browse to the bookmarks.html file created by your bookmarks export (see above).

Where can I find additional information?

NOTE: These instructions were taken from: http://kb.mozillazine.org/Profile_Manager

Additional instructions available at: http://support.mozilla.com/en-US/kb/Managing+profiles

See Also

IS&T Contributions

Documentation and information provided by IS&T staff members


Last Modified:

August 04, 2020

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  1. Sep 05, 2013

    Instead of creating a new profile by hand, it may be better to use a menu built into Firefox that does the same task:

    http://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/reset-firefox-easily-fix-most-problems

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