The Proxy Server Is Refusing Connections: How to Fix It

You open Firefox, or launch Tor Browser, and instead of a web page you get a flat gray screen: The proxy server is refusing connections. Every site does the same thing. Nothing loads slowly, nothing times out halfway, the connection bounces off the proxy the instant the browser tries to reach it. (Chrome shows the same failure as ERR_PROXY_CONNECTION_FAILED.) That exact wording is Firefox and Tor Browser telling you one specific thing: the browser is set to send your traffic through a proxy, and that proxy is not answering on the address and port it was handed. Below is every reason that happens, and the fix for each, in the order worth trying them.

Why does it say the proxy server is refusing connections?

Firefox shows this error when it is configured to use a proxy but cannot open a connection to that proxy's IP and port. The proxy is down, the address or port is wrong, the protocol does not match, or an old proxy setting was left behind by an extension or VPN. The browser gives up before reaching any website.

What the error is actually telling you

This is not a timeout and it is not a website problem. "Refusing connections" means Firefox tried to open a connection to the proxy and was turned away, or nothing was listening at that address at all. The failure sits on the you-to-proxy leg, before any real site is contacted.

That one fact saves you a lot of wasted effort. You do not need to check the website, your DNS, or your firewall rules for the target. The proxy, or the proxy setting pointing at it, is the whole problem. So you fix it in two moves: confirm the proxy itself is alive, then confirm Firefox is pointed at it correctly.

Verify the proxy is alive first

Before you change a single browser setting, find out whether the proxy actually works. If it is dead, no amount of reconfiguring Firefox will help, and if it is alive, you have narrowed the problem down to your settings. Test it outside the browser with curl:

curl -x http://198.51.100.14:8080 --max-time 10 https://httpbin.org/ip

Swap in your real IP and port. If the response shows the proxy's IP, the proxy is fine and your Firefox configuration is the thing to fix. If curl reports a refused connection or hits the ten second timeout, the proxy is down, and you need a different one, not a settings change. The --max-time flag matters here, because a dead proxy will otherwise hang until curl gives up on its own.

If you would rather skip the terminal, paste the IP and port into our free proxy checker and it reports whether the proxy is alive, where it exits, and how fast it is in one pass. For the full version of this test, alive plus fast plus anonymous, our guide on how to check if a proxy is working walks through it.

The five causes, and the fix for each

1. The proxy is down or the ip:port is wrong

The most common cause is the simplest: the proxy is offline, or you typed the address or port wrong. A single transposed digit in the port sends Firefox knocking on a door that was never there, and the connection is refused.

Fix: re-run the curl test above against the exact IP and port you put in Firefox. If it fails, the proxy is either dead or misaddressed. Double check the port in particular, since it is the easiest field to fumble. If the address is right and it still refuses, treat the proxy as down and move to a working one.

2. The wrong protocol is selected (SOCKS vs HTTP)

Firefox lets you enter a proxy as an HTTP proxy or as a SOCKS host, and the two are not interchangeable. Point Firefox at a SOCKS proxy using the HTTP field, or the reverse, and the connection is refused even though the proxy is perfectly alive. As a rule of thumb, a proxy on port 1080 is almost always SOCKS, while 8080, 3128 and 80 are usually HTTP.

Fix: open Firefox Network Settings (the exact path is below) and put the proxy in the right field. An HTTP proxy goes in HTTP Proxy. A SOCKS proxy goes in SOCKS Host, with the correct SOCKS v5 or SOCKS v4 radio selected. The same HTTP-versus-SOCKS choice trips people up in every browser, and our Chrome proxy setup guide shows it from the other side if you are configuring one from scratch.

3. Leftover proxy settings from an extension or VPN

If you never set a proxy on purpose and this error appeared out of nowhere, something set it for you. Proxy-switcher add-ons, ad blockers with a proxy feature, and VPN clients all write into Firefox's proxy configuration. When that tool is uninstalled, disabled, or simply not running, the setting it left behind still points Firefox at a proxy that is no longer there, and every request is refused.

Fix: set Firefox back to No proxy (or Use system proxy settings) in Network Settings. If a browser extension keeps rewriting the setting, disable or remove the extension itself, because it will otherwise put the proxy back the next time it runs. A VPN that exited badly can leave the same trail, so quit and relaunch it cleanly, or clear the setting by hand.

4. Tor is not running or is misconfigured

Tor Browser is a special case of the same problem. It routes traffic through a local Tor process that listens on 127.0.0.1 port 9150. If Tor has not finished connecting, has crashed, or is blocked by your network, that local proxy is not accepting connections, and Tor Browser shows the refusing-connections error against 127.0.0.1.

Fix: close Tor Browser completely and reopen it, then wait for it to finish connecting to the Tor network before you load a page. If it never gets past connecting, your network may be blocking Tor, in which case configure a bridge in Tor's connection settings. If you have both Tor Browser and a standalone Tor service running, a port clash (9150 versus 9050) can cause it too, so run one at a time.

5. The free proxy has died

Free proxies have short lives. They are shared by a lot of people, get overloaded, and are pulled or rotated within hours, so a proxy that loaded pages fine this morning can refuse every connection this afternoon. This is not a bug in your setup, it is the normal lifecycle of a free, shared proxy.

Fix: stop reusing yesterday's proxy and grab one that was confirmed alive minutes ago. Every entry on our free proxy list shows a last-checked time and an uptime figure, so you can pick one that is actually up instead of gambling on a stale dump, then verify it right before you paste it into Firefox.

Where to change proxy settings in Firefox

Every fix above runs through one screen. To reach it:

1. Click the menu button (the three lines, top right) and choose Settings, or type about:preferences in the address bar.
2. Stay on the General panel and scroll to the very bottom.
3. Under Network Settings, click the Settings button.

That opens the Connection Settings dialog, where your options are:

• No proxy turns proxying off entirely. Pick this to rule the proxy out as the cause.
• Use system proxy settings hands control to your Windows or macOS network settings.
• Manual proxy configuration is where you enter an HTTP Proxy or a SOCKS Host, with a port beside each. This is the field to get right for causes 1 and 2 above.
• Automatic proxy configuration URL loads a PAC file, which can itself point at a dead proxy if it is stale.

Make your change, click OK, and reload the page. If the error clears, the setting was the culprit. If it does not, the proxy itself is down, and you are back to finding a live one.

Clear it in order

When the wall shows up, work through it top to bottom and you will land on the cause fast:

1. Test the proxy with curl. Refused there too? The proxy is dead, replace it. Done.
2. Check the protocol. Alive in curl but refused in Firefox? You have HTTP and SOCKS crossed. Fix the field.
3. Check for a leftover setting. Never set a proxy yourself? An extension or VPN did. Set it to No proxy.
4. Restart Tor. Only in Tor Browser? Let Tor finish connecting, or add a bridge.

Almost every case is the first or the last row, a proxy that is simply down. The fastest way to tell a live proxy from a dead one is to check it before you trust it, so when a proxy refuses to connect, paste it into the checker and you will know in seconds which problem you actually have.