[Tip] Disable Firefox Showing Blank or Empty Dummy UI Screen at Startup

Newer versions of Mozilla Firefox web browser such as version 89 and later come with a new feature called “Skeleton UI“. This feature draws a blank or empty UI on your computer screen which resembles with the actual Firefox UI, when you first launch Firefox browser.

The dummy UI draws Firefox fake window frame or chrome containing tabs, address bar, toolbar, etc as shown in following screenshot:

Blank_Empty_Dummy_Skeleton_UI_Showing_Startup_Mozilla_Firefox.png

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As the name suggests, the blank UI is dummy i.e. not functional and you can’t do anything on the dummy UI. It works like a placeholder for the main Firefox window on your screen. It just looks like real Firefox program window but actually it’s just a dummy screen. You can consider it as a splash screen which are shown by many 3rd party software programs at startup.

Following animated image shows the new skeleton UI feature live in action in Firefox browser:

Animation_Showing_Blank_Empty_Skeleton_UI_Startup_Mozilla_Firefox.gif

You might ask why Mozilla team added a fake and non functional UI to Firefox? What’s its use? Actually there is a wise idea behind implementing this skeleton UI feature.

Many times Firefox takes a little time in launching on slower computer systems. Since no progress or visual indication is shown on screen, the user might keep clicking on Firefox shortcut icon to start it again and again. When Firefox is taking time in starting, the user might think that he didn’t click properly on the shortcut icon and he might click on the icon 2-3 more times. As a result, it might again slow down the computer system as multiple instances of Firefox start running in the background.

To overcome this issue, Mozilla team decided to implement skeleton UI feature so that as soon as a user clicks on Firefox icon and the browser starts loading its files and services in background, a dummy or fake UI is shown on user’s screen. It’ll notify user that Firefox has started opening and the user will wait for the browser to load properly on the computer screen.

On slower devices, it might be a useful feature but if you have a faster device, you might find the feature annoying.

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Mozilla team provides a hidden preference/flag to enable or disable skeleton UI feature in Firefox.

Following steps will help you in enabling or disabling new Skeleton UI feature in Mozilla Firefox web browser:

1. Open Firefox Nightly and type about:config in the address bar and press Enter. It’ll show you a warning message, click on “Accept the Risk and Continue” button. It’ll open Firefox’s hidden secret advanced configuration page i.e. about:config page.

2. Now type skeleton in Search filter box and you’ll see following preference in the window:

browser.startup.preXulSkeletonUI

In older versions of Firefox, the preference value is set to false by default, which means the skeleton UI is disabled. In newer versions of Firefox, the preference value is set to true by default, which means the skeleton UI is enabled.

Disable_Enable_Blank_Empty_Skeleton_UI_Startup_Mozilla_Firefox.png

3. If the new skeleton UI is enabled in your Firefox browser and you want to disable it, double-click on the preference and set its value to false. Alternatively, you can click on the Toggle icon given next to the preference name.

If the new skeleton UI is not enabled in your Firefox browser and you want to manually enable it, double-click on the preference and set its value to true. Alternatively, you can click on the Toggle icon given next to the preference name.

That’s it. Restart Firefox browser and it’ll turn on/off skeleton UI based on the preference value modified by you.

BONUS TIP: If you have opened multiple tabs and you don’t want to lose them, you can restart Firefox without losing tabs using methods given in following tutorial:

[Tip] How to Restart Mozilla Firefox Without Losing Tabs

Also Check:

[Tip] Restore Old Classic Theme and UI in Firefox 89 and Later Versions

[Tip] Restore “Compact Mode” Density Option in Firefox Customize Window

[Fix] Restore Real Working Search Box on New Tab Page in Firefox 89 and Later

Published in: Mozilla Firefox

About the author: Vishal Gupta (also known as VG) has been awarded with Microsoft MVP (Most Valuable Professional) award. He holds Masters degree in Computer Applications (MCA). He has written several tech articles for popular newspapers and magazines and has also appeared in tech shows on various TV channels.

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