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Does Firefox store "All Bookmarks" or autosaves to C:? What's the filenames? Dave

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My VISTA computer's motherboard died, and thus the computer, but the hard drive was saved. It's now an external drive to a Win 10 laptop. When I go to C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox the directory is dated 5/23, the day before the crash, so something got updated, but the most recent date on files in the directory is 5/10, including the file firefox..application..505kb. When I double-click it and go Bookmarks>All Bookmarks>Import and Backup>Restore there's no file dates in May except the one created yesterday when I was trying to find a way to get a missing bookmark directory and its contents recovered. Thus: How can I get my missing bookmarks back? Are they on the rescued C: (as some kind of "Favorites" file), or "in the cloud" somewhere? Is the firefox file I mention above the correct file to double-click? All help is immensely appreciated. Thanks, Dave

My VISTA computer's motherboard died, and thus the computer, but the hard drive was saved. It's now an external drive to a Win 10 laptop. When I go to C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox the directory is dated 5/23, the day before the crash, so something got updated, but the most recent date on files in the directory is 5/10, including the file firefox..application..505kb. When I double-click it and go Bookmarks>All Bookmarks>Import and Backup>Restore there's no file dates in May except the one created yesterday when I was trying to find a way to get a missing bookmark directory and its contents recovered. Thus: How can I get my missing bookmarks back? Are they on the rescued C: (as some kind of "Favorites" file), or "in the cloud" somewhere? Is the firefox file I mention above the correct file to double-click? All help is immensely appreciated. Thanks, Dave

Chosen solution

Firefox stores your personal data in the profile folder. This folder is in a hidden location in AppData\Roaming.

  • C:\Users\<user>\AppData\Roaming\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\<profile>\

You would have to locate places.sqlite or backups in the bookmarkbackups folder.


You can copy files like these with Firefox closed to the current profile folder to recover specific data.

  • bookmarks and history: places.sqlite
  • bookmark backups: compressed .jsonlz4 JSON backups in the bookmarkbackups folder
  • cookies.sqlite for the Cookies
  • formhistory.sqlite for saved autocomplete Form Data
  • logins.json (passwords) and key4.db (58+) or key3.db (57 and older) (decryption key) for Passwords saved in the Password Manager
    if you only have key3.db then make sure to remove an existing key4.db
  • cert9.db (58+) or cert8.db (57 and older) for (intermediate) certificates stored in the Certificate Manager
    if you only have cert8.db then make sure to remove an existing cert9.db
  • persdict.dat for words you added to the spelling checker dictionary
  • permissions.sqlite for Permissions and possibly content-prefs.sqlite for other website specific data (Site Preferences)
  • sessionstore.jsonlz4 for open tabs and pinned tabs (see also the sessionstore-backups folder)
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All Replies (8)

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Firefox uses this file; places.sqlite to store History and Bookmarks.

Can you find this file?

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Chosen Solution

Firefox stores your personal data in the profile folder. This folder is in a hidden location in AppData\Roaming.

  • C:\Users\<user>\AppData\Roaming\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\<profile>\

You would have to locate places.sqlite or backups in the bookmarkbackups folder.


You can copy files like these with Firefox closed to the current profile folder to recover specific data.

  • bookmarks and history: places.sqlite
  • bookmark backups: compressed .jsonlz4 JSON backups in the bookmarkbackups folder
  • cookies.sqlite for the Cookies
  • formhistory.sqlite for saved autocomplete Form Data
  • logins.json (passwords) and key4.db (58+) or key3.db (57 and older) (decryption key) for Passwords saved in the Password Manager
    if you only have key3.db then make sure to remove an existing key4.db
  • cert9.db (58+) or cert8.db (57 and older) for (intermediate) certificates stored in the Certificate Manager
    if you only have cert8.db then make sure to remove an existing cert9.db
  • persdict.dat for words you added to the spelling checker dictionary
  • permissions.sqlite for Permissions and possibly content-prefs.sqlite for other website specific data (Site Preferences)
  • sessionstore.jsonlz4 for open tabs and pinned tabs (see also the sessionstore-backups folder)
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Thank you both for your kind attention. I have located the file. I am new to Windows 10,. so please help. I have only 1 user account. In Windows Explorer, under "OneDrive", is my name, which I assume is the location of the account. I have selected the file. If I then use the path Home>Organize> Copy to>, then select the folder David, is this the correct procedure? My concern is that this will replace the contents of David with this one file only. This procedure will add the file to the contents of the folder David, NOT replace what's in it, right? I took a screenprint and saved it in 2 separate LibreOffice files, but the "Choose File" command below would not accept either one. If there's a way to save a printscreen as an image, please tell me.

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Hi, if copy to a place that has same file yes it will replace it. Please follow cor-el's info.

Profile : Make a new one . You can have several Profile's use 1 for testing and copy only as do not use original files.

There is no way to merge 2 sets of bookmarks other than with a html editor or with notepad.

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Well, with great info from everyone (plus immense patience from me) it appears the "case of the missing bookmarks" is solved. I want to extend my unending thanks to all of you for your immense assistance.

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Hello,

I am glad to hear that your problem has been resolved. If you haven't already, please select the answer that solves the problem. This will help other users with similar problems find the solution more easily.

Thank you for contacting Mozilla Support.

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Hi, Welcome. Glad it worked out : For the future please :

Please let us know if this solved your issue or if need further assistance

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DistressedasHeck said

If there's a way to save a printscreen as an image, please tell me.

You can paste into the Windows "Paint" program or similar image editor, then save the pasted image as a PNG file.