Personal user profile

  1. What is a personal profile?
  2. Creating a profile
  3. Switching between profiles
  4. Changing the profile name
  5. Deleting a profile
  6. Sync profiles
  7. Save profile information
  8. Import information from your old profile to your new one
  9. “Your profile is faulty” error

What is a personal profile?

Your profile is your personal set of Yandex Browser settings and information. Your profile is created automatically during browser installation. It stores the following information:

If multiple people use your computer, we recommend creating a personal profile for each user in Yandex Browser. That way your information and browser settings will not get mixed up with someone else's. You can also use an additional profile if you have multiple accounts (for example, a personal and work account) to store their data separately.

Creating a profile

To create a profile:

  1. Click  → Settings.
  2. In the Profiles section, click Add a profile.
  3. Choose a profile icon.
  4. Set a profile name.
  5. If necessary, turn off the option Create a desktop shortcut for this user.
  6. Click Add.

A new window with the selected profile icon will be created in Yandex Browser. You can view all your browser profiles in the settings:

Switching between profiles

  1. Click the profile icon in the upper-right corner of the browser.
  2. Select the desired profile in the menu that appears.

The profile you select will open in a new browser window.

Changing the profile name

To change the profile name:

  1. Switch to the desired profile.
  2. Click  → Settings.
  3. Select a profile from the Profiles block.
  4. Click Change.
  5. In the Edit window, enter a new name.
  6. Click Save.

Deleting a profile

To delete a profile from your computer:

  1. Click  → Settings.
  2. Click on the profile name in the Profiles section.
  3. Click .
  4. In the window that opens, confirm that you want to delete the profile and all related data.
Attention. If you want to be able to restore this profile, sync the browser. Or copy the contents of the directory containing your profile to a convenient location:
Operating system Profile address
Windows C:\Users\Account name\AppData\Local\Yandex\YandexBrowser\User Data\Default
Note. The AppData folder is hidden. To see it, enable hidden folder display.
macOS ~/Library/Application Support/Yandex/YandexBrowser/Default
Operating system Profile address
Windows C:\Users\Account name\AppData\Local\Yandex\YandexBrowser\User Data\Default
Note. The AppData folder is hidden. To see it, enable hidden folder display.
macOS ~/Library/Application Support/Yandex/YandexBrowser/Default

If you synced your profile, then your data will be saved on the server even after you delete it from your local computer.

Sync profiles

Syncing lets you save most of your profile information on a server. That way you can access it from other devices and restore it if your computer crashes.

Save your profile on your computer if you want to save all your browser settings and information (for example, if you need site permissions or want to save open tabs).

Save profile information

This may be necessary if you plan to restore all your data after you reinstall your computer's OS or move all your profile information to another computer.

Tip. If you only need bookmarks from your current profile, you can export them in an HTML file and then import them into your new profile.

Copy your profile to a convenient location. To open your profile directory:

Open the following folder in Explorer C:\Users\Your account name\AppData\Local\Yandex\YandexBrowser\User Data\Default (to see the AppData folder, enable the hidden folder display.

Note. Support for Microsoft Windows XP and Vista operating systems ended in April 2017.

Import information from your old profile to your new one

You may need to import data from an old profile to a new one if you want to sync data from your current profile under a different username. To do this:

  1. Create a new profile.
  2. Import data from your old profile to your new one.
  3. Log in to your new profile and sync it under a different username.

To import information from your old profile to your new one:

  1. Close the browser.
  2. Open the folder containing your old profile in Explorer C:\Users\Your account name\AppData\Local\Yandex\YandexBrowser\User Data\Default.
    Note. The AppData folder is hidden. To see it, enable hidden folder display.
  3. Copy the following files to the directory containing your new profile C:\Users\Your account name\AppData\Local\Yandex\YandexBrowser\User Data\Profile <number>:
    • Ya Login Data (or Login Data);
    • Ya Login Data-journal (or Login Data-journal);
    • History
    • Tableau
    • Bookmarks
    • Favicons
    • All files in the Extensions folder.
  4. Launch the browser, sign in to your new profile, and make sure that your data and settings were restored.

“Your profile is faulty” error

If an error occurs with your profile, Yandex Browser will launch in recovery mode with a clean profile. In this case, you will see this message:

To restore data from your old profile:

If you have synced data at least once
  1. Click  → New user.
  2. Enter the name of your new profile and click Add.
  3. Click  → Authorize.
  4. Enter your Yandex username and password.

That way all your data will be transferred to your new profile from the Yandex server. To find out more about syncing, see Browser Syncing.

If you have never synced your profile
  1. Click  → New user.
  2. Enter the name of your new profile and click Add.
  3. Import data from your old profile to your new one.

If you were not able to transfer data from your old profile to your new one, report the issue to Tech Support using the Feedback form.