Recover Firefox browsing sessions

In this article we are answering one of the recent questions from our user about recovering a Firefox browsing session. This might also be a useful scenario for data analysts.

I need help recovering lost tabs from a Firefox session previous to the current one as I mistakenly selected “close tabs” instead of “restore last session” after I did a force quit of the browser. I have already checked into the various standard menus, where the “restore session” option is usually found, but it’s not active. My browser history is not cached but automatically deleted when i close it..

Is it possible to recover Firefox browsing sessions if the browser’s history is automatically deleted after each run?

The short answer is YES. However, as with other recovery cases, you need to look into details.

Usually, it is the places.sqlite file from your Firefox profile that contains all your Firefox bookmarks and lists of all the files you’ve downloaded and websites you’ve visited. To access your profile, usually you click the menu button, then Help (question mark), select Troubleshooting Information, and under the Application Basics section, click Show Folder right next to Profile Folder. A window with your profile files will open.

Therefore, to address the initial issue in this article, try to recover all the places.sqlite files using Disk Drill and check their contents for browsing history. Note that if the Recovery Vault feature of Disk Drill was enabled previously, chances are you will be able to recover the browsing session.