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I recently upgraded to Firefox 40.0.3 (Mac, running Mac OS 10.6.8) and have discovered that, now, when I open a new tab or window, the default position of the cursor is in the search bar in the middle of the window.

This is never the behavior I want, and it's breaking my workflow. Is there a way to make it not do this? The previous default was the cursor was in the location bar, which is what I would like.

(This question is the exact inverse of this question, which is now apparently obviated with this release of FF, and none of the answers to pertain to reversing the problem.)

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Firefox will place the cursor in the location bar when it opens a blank page.

This "previous default" behavior is shown only for the blank page or new tab page, according to this thread on Mozilla support forum that has been quoted below.

Generally speaking, when Firefox loads a page with a "real" document body, the focus is placed on the body of the page. The new tab page is a special exception because regardless of what page you load in the new tab, Firefox will try to select the address bar. (In some cases, the page will override Firefox's efforts.)

To make Firefox behave with "previous default", edit the preferences in Firefox.

  1. Open the preferences tab in Firefox (On Mac OS X, it is Firefox > Preferences according to this article on MozillaZine)
  2. Look into General > Startup and find the option with When Firefox starts:
  3. Change from Show my homepage to Show a blank page
  4. Close the preferences tab to finish

The effect is immediate. Firefox will now place the cursor in the location bar for a blank page.