A growing number of Firefox users on Mac (and Windows) are reporting that they are unable to load any websites. The browser hangs indefinitely and shows nothing at all, thanks to what seems like a background server error.
The good news is that there is a relatively simple fix that you can implement yourself until Firefox eliminates the problem for good. We’ll show you how.
Firefox stops loading websites
Firefox got a background update to version 96 on Wednesday. It was initially believed that it was this that caused the browser to stop working. However, users have since reported the same issue with earlier Firefox releases.
It seems the problem stems from an issue with Firefox’s own data analytics server, which was recently updated to support HTTP3, rather than the browser itself. But users have found a workaround that fixes the problem.
The trick, which works on Mac and Windows, disables Firefox’s HTTP3 implementation until a real fix is rolled out. Here’s what you need to do.
Fix Firefox on Mac and Windows
- Open a new window in Firefox.
- Type about:config into the address bar, then hit enter.
- Search for network.http.http3.enabled.
- Change this setting to false.
- Quit Firefox and reopen.
Firefox should now work properly again. It’s important to remember, however, that HTTP3 should be reenabled in the future — when Firefox has properly fixed this problem — to ensure full compatibility with all services in the future.
Killian Bell is a freelance writer based in the U.K. He has an interest in all things tech and also covers Android over at CultofAndroid.com. You can follow him on Twitter via @killianbell.
