Installing the Flash plugin

Adobe Flash Player is a plugin that allows browsers such as Firefox to display Flash media on web pages. Flash is often used for animations, videos and games.

Windows:

Installing Flash using the Plugin Finder Service

Watch a video of these instructions

1. Go to a page that uses Flash such as Adobe's test page.
2. A yellow notification bar will appear above the webpage. Click Install Missing Plugins. The Plugin Finder Service window will appear.
   
   
   
3. Select the most recent version of Flash listed, then click Next.
   
   
   
4. Review the end-user license agreement and select I agree if you agree to it. To begin installation, click Next.
   
   
   
   • If Windows asks to allow Adobe Flash Player to make changes to your computer, click Yes.
5. When the installation is done, click Finish. The page will reload and you should have Flash installed.
   
   

Installing the Flash plugin manually

Windows:

If the above steps do not work, you can try installing the Flash plugin manually:

1. Go to Flash Player download page at Adobe.com and download the Flash installer.
2. From the menu at the top of the Firefox windowbar, select FileFirefox and then select the ExitQuit FirefoxQuit menu item.
3. Open the file you downloaded (i.e. install_flash_player.exe), then follow the installer's instructions.

Mac OS:

1. Go to Flash Player download page at Adobe.com and download the Flash installer.
2. From the menu at the top of the Firefox windowbar, select FileFirefox and then select the ExitQuit FirefoxQuit menu item.
3. Open the file you downloaded (i.e. install_flash_player_osx_ub.dmg).
4. In the Finder, open the Adobe Flash Player.pkg to run the installer, then follow the installer's instructions.

Linux:

The simplest way to install Flash is to use your distribution's package manager. To install the latest version manually:

1. Go to Flash Player download page at Adobe.com.
2. When prompted, save the file install_flash_player_10_linux.tar.gz.
3. From the menu at the top of the Firefox windowbar, select FileFirefox and then select the ExitQuit FirefoxQuit menu item.
4. Open a Terminal window (in Gnome, click on the Applications menu, select Accessories, and then select Terminal.)
5. In the Terminal window, change to the directory where you saved the file you downloaded (e.g. cd /home/user/Downloads).
6. Extract libflashplayer.so from file you downloaded with the command tar -zxvf install_flash_player_10_linux.tar.gz.
7. As the super user, copy the extracted file, libflashplayer.so, to your Firefox installation directory's plugins sub-directory. For example, if Firefox is installed in /usr/lib/mozilla, use the command sudo cp libflashplayer.so /usr/lib/mozilla/plugins and then enter your super user password when prompted.
   
   

After you install Flash, start Firefox again. To confirm that Flash installed, open the Tools and then select Add-ons. If the installation was successful, Shockwave Flash will appear as an active item.

Troubleshooting the Flash plugin

See Managing the Flash plugin for steps to troubleshoot the Flash plugin and keep it up to date.