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I would like to know if there is a keyboard shortcut for switching the search engine in the search bar in Firefox. The current way to do is clicking on the down arrow beside the icon, but I am looking for a quick keyboard shortcut.

Checked the Firefox help, it just has this regarding the switching of search engines in search bar.

I need this, as I need to frequently switch between Google and the internal intranet search engine.

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4 Answers 4

Reset to default
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  1. Click at the icon
  2. Select "Manage Search Engines…"
  3. Select the search engine you want to set a shortcut for
  4. Click on "Edit keyword…"
  5. Give a shortcut, e.g. "g" for Google

Now you can type into the address bar the chosen search shortcut followed by what you like to search. Example: g weather berne.

To switch to the address bar with the keyboard, use the shortcut Ctrl+L. You could also open a new tab (Ctrl+T), because it sets the focus to the address bar automatically.

By the way: this works for nearly all search fields on any website. Just right-click on a search field and select "Add a keyword for this search…" (don't know the actual English translation). Instead of adding this search to the search widget, Firefox saves it as a bookmark.

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  • Perfect.......:)
    – mtk
    Commented Sep 13, 2012 at 10:24
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    The universal 'Add a keyword' is really helpful. Didn't know about it. Thanks
    – mtk
    Commented Sep 13, 2012 at 11:46
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    this doesn't work anymore. I wonder why firefox has removed it... My workflow has slow down a bit since they removed this.
    – David 天宇 Wong
    Commented Dec 10, 2014 at 14:29
  • @David天宇Wong: I can’t test the new version currently, but I assume you only refer to the first solution (via search engine) I described, right? Hopefully the second solution (via bookmark) still works. I think it was never really needed to offer two different ways to achieve almost the same.
    – unor
    Commented Dec 10, 2014 at 15:20
  • @unor wow! I didn't see that second part of your answer. This is awesome, and so secretely hidden. How do you erase that if you don't want it anymore?
    – David 天宇 Wong
    Commented Dec 10, 2014 at 18:06
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In newer versions of Firefox, the shortcut you are looking for is Alt + Up/Down.

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  • in previous versions with the old search bar it's also Alt+Up/Down. I didn't notice that this also work for the new one, because now the search engines are listed horizontally
    – phuclv
    Commented Jul 15, 2018 at 13:00
  • Confirmed this is the case, at least for firefox60esr onwards
    – Xavier T.
    Commented Sep 4, 2019 at 8:48
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There is a shortcut for exactly this task: from the search bar, press control + Down(Next)/Up(Previous).

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    cntrl + Down/Up is not working anymore since version 34.0. Does anybody know how to do it now?
    – Akronix
    Commented Dec 8, 2014 at 21:55
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    Firefox 34+ can still do this if you use this addon, see this answer.
    – Wilfred Hughes
    Commented Jan 31, 2015 at 13:27
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    @WilfredHughes Thank you, but I do like the new search bar.However, I'm missing to have a shortcut again for changing from one search engine to another before to write the search phrase. The workaround it's to use the <kbd>tab</kbd> button once you're on the search bar and the <kbd>up</kbd> and <kbd>down</kbd> arrow keys. More info here
    – Akronix
    Commented Feb 3, 2015 at 12:57
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You can use Ctrl+K or Ctrl+E to focus on the search bar and then use Ctrl+↑/↓ as per Akronix's answer.

Unor's method in conjunction with Ctrl+L is of course a lot faster for everyday use.

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  • notice that now ctrl + E doesn't open the search bar anymore, only ctrl + K does.
    – Akronix
    Commented Feb 3, 2015 at 13:25

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