How to Stop Pop-Ups in Firefox

By David Murphy 10 April 2014

Mozilla’s Firefox browser should automatically block pop-up windows by default. That doesn’t mean that it’s perfect, however. There are a number of reasons why you might be seeing pop-up windows throughout your normal Firefox browsing – some good and fixable, some less pleasant and, while fixable, a bit more annoying. Here are some possible culprits, and how to stop them.

Ensure Pop-Up Blocking Feature is On in Firefox

1. Click on the Firefox button in the upper-left of your browser and click on Options — it’ll pull out a little submenu when you hover over it with your mouse, but you can ignore that and just click right on the word Options.

2. Select the Content tab and make sure that “Block pop-up windows” is checked. If it isn’t, check it.

Check Your Pop-Up Blocking Exceptions

1. Follow steps 1 and 2 above.

2. Click the Exceptions button. Remove any existing exceptions.

Download a Pop-Up Blocking Extension

1. Click the Firefox button on the top left and click Add-ons.

2. Search for an ad-blocking add-on, such as Adblock Plus. It does a great job of removing the annoyances from your Web browsing, and it comes with absolutely no configuration needed to begin working. You can tweak it, yes, but it’s good to go the moment you click «Add to Firefox.»

Install an Antivirus Program

1. Search for and download a malware program such as Malwarebytes’ Anti-Malware – it’s free, it’s efficient, and it does a great job of finding all sorts of nasties on your system.

2. Run a scan your computer to see if any kind of malware is otherwise making pop-ups appear, in general, when they should not.

3. Download a program like Avast, or even Microsoft Security Essentials (preinstalled as Windows Defender for Windows 8 users), to ensure that you’ve done the most thorough job possible finding any potential malware on your PC. If you can, run these apps in Windows’ Safe Mode to ensure that you aren’t missing anything.

Uninstall Suspicious Software

1. Peruse your programs (via the Control Panel’s Programs and Features option or its Add/Remove Programs option, depending on your version of Windows) to see if there’s anything that you’ve recent installed that just doesn’t look like it belongs. Perhaps there’s a toolbar app running that’s causing all the pop-ups, or some “game” that’s actually a big advertising setup in disguise, et cetera. If you see something that looks odd – an app or game you haven’t used, don’t recognize, and looks a little sketchy (as in, isn’t something Microsoft-y) – give it a quick Google search to see if its suspicious.

Pop-up blocker settings, exceptions and troubleshooting

This document explains all of the settings available in Mozilla Firefox for controlling pop-ups.

Table of Contents

What are pop-ups?

Pop-up windows, or pop-ups, are windows that appear automatically without your permission. They vary in size but usually don’t cover the whole screen. Some pop-ups open on top of the current Firefox window, while others appear underneath Firefox (pop-unders).

Firefox allows you to control both pop-ups and pop-unders in Firefox Options Preferences Settings Preferences . Pop-up blocking is turned on by default, so you don’t have to worry about enabling it to prevent pop-ups from appearing in Firefox.

When blocking a pop-up, Firefox displays an information bar (if it hasn’t been previously dismissed – see below), as well as an icon in the address bar.

When you click either the Options Preferences Settings Preferences button in the info bar or the icon in the address bar, a menu is displayed with the following choices:

• Allow/Block pop-ups for this site
• Edit Pop-up Blocker Options Preferences …
• Don’t show this message when pop-ups are blocked
• (show the blocked pop-up)

Pop-up blocker settings

To access the pop-up blocker settings:

1. In the Menu bar at the top of the screen, click Firefox and select Preferences . Click the menu button and select Options . Preferences . Settings .
2. Select the Privacy & Security panel.

• Under the Permissions section, uncheck the box next to Block pop-up windows to disable the pop-up blocker altogether.
• A click on Exceptions… opens a dialog box with a list of sites that you want to allow to display pop-ups.
• The dialog box offers you the following choices:
  

Allow: Click this to add a website to the exceptions list. Remove Website: Click this to remove a website from the exceptions list. Remove All Websites: Click this to remove all of the websites in the exceptions list.

Pop-ups not being blocked

Is the pop-up coming from Firefox?

The pop-up may not actually be coming from Firefox. You can determine where the pop-up is coming from by the appearance of the window.

• If you see the address bar with the Site Info button the Tracking Protection button and the Site Identity button (a shield and a padlock) in the pop-up window, the pop-up is coming from Firefox.
• If you don’t see the button these buttons , you may have malware on your computer that causes the pop-ups. For help, see Troubleshoot Firefox issues caused by malware.

Is the pop-up blocker on and enabled for this site?

1. In the Menu bar at the top of the screen, click Firefox and select Preferences . Click the menu button and select Options . Preferences . Settings .
2. Select the Privacy & Security panel and go to the Permissions section.
3. Make sure the Block pop-up windows checkbox is checked.
4. To the right of Block pop-up windows, click the Exceptions… button. A dialog box will open with a list of sites that are allowed to show pop-ups.
5. If the site that’s opening pop-ups is listed here, select it and press Remove Website .
6. Click on Save Changes to update your changes.
7. Close the about:preferences page. Any changes you’ve made will automatically be saved.

Is the pop-up shown after a mouse click or a key press?

Certain events, such as clicking or pressing a key, can spawn pop-ups regardless of if the pop-up blocker is on. This is intentional, so that Firefox doesn’t block pop-ups that websites need to work.

Is it a true pop-up window?

Sometimes ads are designed to look like windows, but really aren’t. Firefox’s pop-up blocker can’t stop these ads.

Mozilla surveys

When you visit a Mozilla website, sometimes you’ll see a pop-up asking you to participate in a survey. The only third-party that Mozilla ever uses for surveys is SurveyGizmo, which has been vetted by our legal and privacy teams. The Firefox pop-up blocker doesn’t block these pop-ups.

These fine people helped write this article:

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Popup Blocker Ultimate by Mojtaba Daneshi

Best Popup Blocker for Firefox. (Best in Rating, Performance, This addon does NOT track user activities same as others)If your Firefox version is not 57+ please install version 8.1 from Official website.

Extension Metadata

Used by

Popup Blocker Ultimate makes it easy to block pop-ups.

Support Desktop and Android

IMPORTANT: If your Firefox version is not 57+ please install 8.1 version from Official website

As you know, the default Firefox pop-up blocker cannot block all pop-ups, especially the ones which are triggered upon clicking. These tricky pop-ups can be annoying and waste precious time, effort and bandwidth.

Popup Blocker Ultimate is designed to identify and block these pop-ups.

Web Extension version:

Allow all:Through this method, Popup Blocker Ultimate will allow all popups to execute.
Block all:Through this method, Popup Blocker Ultimate will block all popups to execute. Be careful
Block all but whitelist:Through this method, Popup Blocker Ultimate will block all popups but whitelist.
Allow all but blacklist:Through this method, Popup Blocker Ultimate will allow all popups but blacklist.

Furthermore, you can white list specific websites if you wish so.

You can use ‘*’ character in whitelisting and blacklisting domains (e.g., *.google.com).

Legacy version:
This add-on has two methods to prevent popups from showing up:

Strict: Through this method, Popup Blocker Ultimate will change the browser’s settings so that the browser can identify and block popups by itself.

Analyze: Using a Analyze approach, Popup Blocker Ultimate will first analyze a website’s codes and then block the identified popup sections.
While using Analyze method, you might encounter some irregular behavior in web pages which can be solved by white listing said web page.

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How do I disable a Pop-up blocker?

• 11 replies
• 226 have this problem
• 316745 views
• Last reply by pctech33

Where do I go to disable the Pop-up blockers, so I can play certain games on Pogo?

URL of affected sites

Chosen solution

You can add an exception for pogo.com, when you get the yellow bar that says a pop-up has been blocked. See Pop-up blocker settings, exceptions and troubleshooting.

To completely disable the pop-up blocker, go to Tools > Options > Content and uncheck Block pop-up windows

All Replies (11)

Chosen Solution

You can add an exception for pogo.com, when you get the yellow bar that says a pop-up has been blocked. See Pop-up blocker settings, exceptions and troubleshooting.

To completely disable the pop-up blocker, go to Tools > Options > Content and uncheck Block pop-up windows

‘i am having some problems with some of the websites.’

i hve the same problem and i did but wen i open new windows all i get is untitled pages

on my mac, under tools, i do not have ‘options’ that i can click on to disable pop-ups. please let me know if there is another way to disable the pop-ups in firefox. thanks.

On Mac, it’s Firefox > Preferences > Content. All the info is in the Pop-up blocker settings, exceptions and troubleshooting article. 🙂

I thank you so much Chris for helping with the disabling of pop-up blockers for pogo.com. I have been battling this problem for weeks(even hired someone twice) because I was unable to get into a room when I wanted my own settings. All I needed to do is follow your instructions and it was an easy fix. thanks again for your help. Kim_505

i did all the above. however, after few successful popups, the firefox4 blocks them again, and it seems as i can do nothing, but restart the application. also the message that firefox blocked the popup window shows up just for a split of the second. very annoying. i am using some business application and there everything is based on popups . any ideas? thanks!

For disabling the feature of pop-up blocker in Firefox, go to the tools menu and click on ‘Options’ followed by the content panel. To disable all the pop-up blockers, uncheck the ‘Block pop-up Window’ box. In order to disable the pop-up blocker for a given set of websites, click on the ‘Exceptions’ and enter the URL of the websites whose pop-up need not be blocked. Close the Window and click ‘OK’.

I have unchecked the «Block pop-up Window» box until the cows come home and it STILL keeps blocking me when I’m trying to work Quicken online! I cannot see any message pop up, just the one telling me firefox is blocking it. It doesn’t matter if I have that site «allowed» or not. It doesn’t matter if I have no blocking at all!

It doesn’t matter if I quit & re-start Firefox! It just keeps disallowing me to work my banking books online and forces me to just quit to get out of the loop!

Please help! How is this possible?

PS — I have also «allowed» *.intuit.com as instructed by intuit. Still doesn’t work! ARGH!

For disabling the feature of pop-up blocker in Firefox, go to the tools menu and click on ‘Options’ followed by the content panel.

To disable all the pop-up blockers, uncheck the ‘Block pop-up Window’ box.

In order to disable the pop-up blocker for a given set of websites, click on the ‘Exceptions’ and enter the URL of the websites whose pop-up need not be blocked. Close the Window and click ‘OK’.