Although Firefox enjoys the largest market share in the web browser industry, Internet Explorer is still a very popular browser for many users. Unfortunately, it can be difficult to make Windows 7 understand that you want Firefox to be the default browser on your PC.
Whether the cause us a plug-in, a glitch, or some unknown reason, some people experience a problem with setting Firefox as a computer’s default browser. Each time they restart Windows 7, Internet Explorer becomes the default browser no matter how many times these people set Firefox as the default. Learn how to force Windows 7 to permanently accept Firefox as the default web browser.
Set Firefox as Default Browser
If you constantly have to reset Firefox as the default browser, this trick will deny your computer access to Internet Explorer so that your PC will have to use Firefox when you click on a link. This method of setting Firefox as the default browser is a last resort fix. If this trick doesn’t work for you, you may have to uninstall IE altogether.
Log in to Windows 7 using an account with administrative privileges. Click on Start and type Default into the Search Programs and Files search box.
Press Enter and Windows 7 will open up the Default Programs options window. Click on the link titled Set Program Access and Computer Defaults.
In the Computer Defaults option window, click on the Custom option and Windows 7 will show you a list of options for program defaults.
Look for a set of options titled Choose a Default Web Browser. Normally, you should have the Use My Current Web Browser option chosen. This means that the browsers will decide using their own options which one is the default browser. Here, you will override the options of the browsers themselves and force Windows 7 to accept Firefox as the default browser at the administrative level.
Click the option titled Mozilla Firefox and make sure the option next to it titled Enable Access to this Program is checked. Now uncheck the option next to Internet Explorer titled Enable Access to this Program. This will force Windows 7 to ignore whether or not IE is set as the default browser at the software level.
Click OK, restart your computer, and see which browser Windows 7 recognizes as the default. You may want to run through the steps above again just to make sure that the options you chose are still the same.
At worst, you may have to uninstall IE in order to avoid having it set as the default web browser on your computer. At best, this trick will work but you will have to run through the steps above to undo this change should you want to start using IE again.
Unfortunately, this means that your computer will operate as if IE were not installed on the computer. This trick doesn’t work for everyone but it can be a last resort fix when IE keeps overriding Firefox as the default browser.