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Running Firefox 31, Windows 7:

I was running into a bug on a website that I'm testing, where some things that did exist but do not anymore, were still showing up. I tried clearing the cache by pressing Ctrl+F5, but that was not fixing the issue. I then tried clearing cookies, and that still wasn't fixing the issue.

I then tried viewing the site on a different computer -- also running Firefox 31 -- and the site was showing up like it should, with the old stuff that was deleted gone like it should have been. I tried clearing the cache using Ctrl+F5 on the computer that was having the issues for the 50th time, but to no avail, I was still seeing the bug.

I then tried going into the settings instead of pressing Ctrl+F5, and clearing cache that way, by deleting only the cache. This actually worked for me, and I was no longer seeing the bug.

So with that known, why was I still seeing the cache, even though I hit Ctrl+F5 many times to reload the page without the cache? The code didn't change while I was doing all of this, it just seems Ctrl+F5 wasn't working at all for me for some reason (and if I press F3 it does the find function so I know my F-keys are working).

Even the Firefox support site shows that Ctrl+F5 can be used to override the cache, but that wasn't working for me. So does Ctrl+F5 just randomly not work? What could the issue have been? It feels like I now need to go into the settings every single time I want to reload the page without cache, which is fairly often. I know there are workarounds like disabling cache completely or plugins to remove it on click, but I still want cache to show up sometimes, and if the key combination that firefox itself gives us doesn't work sometimes, who's to say a plugin made by some third party developer won't work randomly either?

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  • 3
    same problem for me. Out of the blue my FFv45.0 suddenly has this problem. F5 or Ctrl+F5 are plain silent and do anything at all. FF45 on another pc doesn't have that issue though.
    – Pavel P
    Mar 15, 2016 at 16:01
  • Been having the same issue for a while, not sure which Fx version started this. All the shortcuts to reload + purge cache mentioned there en.wikipedia.org/wiki/… don't work for me at the moment :/ The quickest workaround is Ctrl + Shift + Del and then purge cache from here, but that's not very satisfying...
    – user14764
    Apr 30, 2017 at 20:52
  • It's important to keep in mind that Ctrl+F5 bypasses the cache, and does not clear it. What was the bug related to? I ask because .htaccess redirects are cached separately from the main cache which Ctrl+F5 bypasses. Also, did you try a private browsing window?
    – FCTW
    May 1, 2017 at 21:37
  • @FCTW sorry, this was posted nearly 3 years ago and I don't remember the exact problem I was personally having or other steps I took trying to fix it, aside from what is in the question
    – Alex Podworny
    May 4, 2017 at 20:57
  • @AlexPodworny Yeah, I only noticed the age after I had already commented.
    – FCTW
    May 5, 2017 at 20:27

2 Answers 2

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How to get around the issue

If Ctrl-F5 isn't working, Ctrl-Shift-R works as a fine substitute to reload the page without the cache.

Why this happens

The Ctrl-F5 key event may be captured by your OS, and so Firefox never sees it. For example, XFCE captures Ctrl-F5 key events, and tries to switch to the fifth workspace.

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<Firefox>

Reload the page by emptying cache:

Ctrl+F5 or Ctrl+Shift+R

Reload the page by not emptying cache:

F5 or Ctrl+R

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