How to Uninstall Firefox

As a neck-and-neck competitor with Google's Chrome browser, Firefox has plentiful advantages for Web surfers who want them, including standards like privacy-protected browsing, tabs, a download manager, extension and theme support, to name a few. Even though it has an impressive usage share percentage, there's no perfect Web browser for most people. Uninstalling Firefox for those who decide against it is a streamlined process, except for the after-the-fact sweeping up of minor, unwanted files and folders.

Always close all Firefox windows before attempting the uninstall routine. Some users may need to open the Task Manager (in Windows) or Activity Monitor (in macOS) to determine whether or not Firefox is active in the background.

Windows users can uninstall the Firefox browser by opening either the Control Panel and going to 'Uninstall a program,' or opening Settings and going to 'applications.' Both options result in a list of installed software that you can scroll through until you see the Firefox icon. Select it (with right-click in Control Panel, or left-click, otherwise) and Uninstall. Doing this launches a dedicated Firefox removal tool. Although most of it is self-explanatory, users might note the 'refresh' option, which can reset Firefox and be a helpful alternative to uninstalling and reinstalling it. Another even faster option is clicking Start, going to Firefox's shortcut, right-clicking it and clicking the Uninstall option there.

If,for some reason, the uninstall tool doesn't open, you can navigate to it and launch it outside of the Windows Settings or Control Panel's interface manually. The file, 'helper.exe,' is in the 'uninstall' sub-folder of the Mozilla Firefox program folder. If you have a 32-bit version of Windows, that folder is in 'Program Files,' but if you have a 64-bit OS, it's in 'Program Files (x86).'

For the macOS, users only need to open Finder, go to Applications, and click-drag Firefox to their Trash – or right-click Firefox and use the Move to Trash option. Empty the Trash to make this change permanent. Note that the Trash empties files older than thirty days, so this step is optional automatically.

Both Windows and macOS users may need to erase associated files that these uninstall routines don't delete. For Windows users, look in the previously-mentioned 'Mozilla Firefox' folder and the 'Users/(user's account name)/AppData/Roaming.'

For macOS, display the Library folder by holding the Option key while clicking Finder's Go menu. In the Library's Application Support sub-section, look for a Firefox folder and Trash it.

These steps should deal with the remaining unwanted files from a previous Firefox installation. However, your computer will not experience any significant side effects from leaving them alone. Experts recommend these cleanup steps for users who want to get the most out of their hard drive space.