Join the Mozilla’s Test Days event from Dec 2–8 to test the new Firefox address bar on Firefox Beta 134 and get a chance to win Mozilla swag vouchers! 🎁

Search Support

Avoid support scams. We will never ask you to call or text a phone number or share personal information. Please report suspicious activity using the “Report Abuse” option.

Learn More

Despite the option not being checked, "Search for text when you start typing" won't STOP

more options

Whatever it's actually called, "Quick Find" or "Find-As-You-Type", it is driving me completely nuts. I first noticed it on a wiki website, where I'd click on the search bar, start typing, and I'd get exactly one character down before suddenly the bar I associated with pressing "Ctrl+F" would pop up and hijack my typing. It happens extremely often but unpredictably. It also happens when opening a new tab and typing in the address bar.

Sometimes, the "Ctrl+F" bar doesn't pop up, but the screen still bounces around "finding" the letters I'm typing. I have no idea what the difference is.

After a few halfhearted google searches describing the problem, I quickly discovered this is a Firefox feature. Every single help thread I could find involved going into the Options menu and finding the feature, and unchecking it. It took some further googling to find out where this option was, but I found it. Tools>Options>General>Browsing>Search for text when you start typing

The problem is, the option was already unchecked. It always was unchecked. It has never been checked. And yet it KEEPS ON FINDING AS I TYPE. The level of my frustration is causing me emotional distress at this point. I've used Firefox for DECADES and now I'm considering switching to Chrome if this doesn't stop because I cannot handle this.

Whatever it's actually called, "Quick Find" or "Find-As-You-Type", it is driving me completely nuts. I first noticed it on a wiki website, where I'd click on the search bar, start typing, and I'd get exactly one character down before suddenly the bar I associated with pressing "Ctrl+F" would pop up and hijack my typing. It happens extremely often but unpredictably. It also happens when opening a new tab and typing in the address bar. Sometimes, the "Ctrl+F" bar doesn't pop up, but the screen still bounces around "finding" the letters I'm typing. I have no idea what the difference is. After a few halfhearted google searches describing the problem, I quickly discovered this is a Firefox feature. Every single help thread I could find involved going into the Options menu and finding the feature, and unchecking it. It took some further googling to find out where this option was, but I found it. Tools>Options>General>Browsing>Search for text when you start typing The problem is, the option was already unchecked. It always was unchecked. It has never been checked. And yet it KEEPS ON FINDING AS I TYPE. The level of my frustration is causing me emotional distress at this point. I've used Firefox for DECADES and now I'm considering switching to Chrome if this doesn't stop because I cannot handle this.

All Replies (2)

more options

Hi, give this a try : uninstall Firefox. Then Delete the Mozilla Firefox Folders in C:\Program Files , C:\Program Files(x86) & C:\ProgramData Then restart system. Then run Windows Disk Cleanup. (Note: This should be Pinned and run Weekly, If never done below expect 10's of gig's) Then run it again and click the button that says Cleanup System Files. Note: your Firefox Profile is saved. But you should make a back up before you do :

Reinstall with Current Release Firefox 61.0.1 with a Full Version Installer

Please let us know if this solved your issue or if need further assistance.

more options

" I first noticed it on a wiki website, where I'd click on the search bar, start typing, and I'd get exactly one character down before suddenly the bar I associated with pressing "Ctrl+F" would pop up and hijack my typing. "

When focus is on the webpage hitting the ' (single quote mark) or the / (slash) key will activate the Quick Find bar.