It’ll no longer shift or transfer the focus to address bar. Now open new tab page in Firefox and click inside the search box and type any search term and it’ll start working again. It’ll immediately convert the dummy search box into a real search box on new tab page. Alternatively, you can click on the Toggle icon given next to the preference name. To restore a real working search box on new tab page, double-click on the preference and set its value to false.

The preference value is set to true by default, which means the search box on new tab page is not a real one.ģ. Now type awesomebar in Search filter box and you’ll see following preference in the window:ī.handoffToAwesomebar It’ll open Firefox’s hidden secret advanced configuration page i.e. It’ll show you a warning message, click on “ Accept the Risk and Continue” button. Open Firefox Nightly and type about:config in the address bar and press Enter. Thanks to our reader “ Robert Snyder” for sharing it.įollowing steps will help you in bring back real search box on new tab page in Firefox 89 and later versions:ġ. If you want to restore previous working search box on new tab page, this tutorial will help you.įortunately, Mozilla has provided a hidden preference/flag to disable the new fake search box and make the search box working again on new tab page in Firefox. Many Firefox users may not like this change and might get frustrated with this annoying behavior. In past, Chrome also used to come with a dummy search box on new tab page and we told you how to put a real search box on new tab page in Chrome in this tutorial. This behavior is quite similar to older versions of Google Chrome web browser. So basically the search box given on New Tab page no longer works and has become just a placeholder for the main address bar. If you installed or upgraded to Mozilla Firefox version 89 or later, you might have noticed that the Search box present on New Tab page or Homepage (start page) has become a dummy or fake box.Īs soon as you click inside the search box on new tab page and start typing anything inside the box, the focus is immediately moved to the address bar and the characters are actually typed inside the address bar.

Google search bar firefox