Hi, it will only show recently visited until you have populated all the tiles with your own ones. When you have added a site that you want to keep there - pin it. See - Customize your Firefox New Tab page.

Further info on the New Tab page which might be of interest -

You can change the number of tiles on the New Tab Page by zooming in or out (Ctrl and + key, or Ctrl and - key).

You may also want to keep the same zoom setting when clicking on a new tab: Type about:config into the address bar, press Enter, accept the warning, scroll down to browser.newtab.preload and double click on it to change 'Value' from True to False.

It is also possible in about:config to change the maximum number of tiles, by scrolling down to browser.newtabpage.columns (or .rows), then right click > Modify, to set a new number in 'Value.'

As an alternative, you may like to try the add-on New Tab Tools.

If your question is resolved by this or another answer, please take a minute to let us know. Thank you.

See this paragraph about how to "Pin a site" in the New Tab Page.

Quite honestly, if you want to change the number or columns and rows that appear regardless of the zoom level you want to use. you might be better off using the New Tabs Tools extension that Scribe hyperlinked. Something with rows & columns on the new tab page was changed in Firefox 39, raising the ire of many users over this past weekend, and hopefully that will be may be "fixed" in a later version.

I can't get mine to do anything, after updating to 39!! I have only four tiles, and every time I try to add one, it opens the web page instead of adding it to the page! And if I select "show top sites & suggestions", absolutely nothing happens! Yes, this is definitely "raising the ire" of this user, as I use this feature all the time, and now it's completely useless.... Why things that have worked fine for years, stop working with new updates is frustrating, and puzzling. I sure hope it gets fixed, cause it's not working at all at this point.

the-edmeister said

See this paragraph about how to "Pin a site" in the New Tab Page. and hopefully that will be may be "fixed" in a later version.

The How to PIn a Site page is useless, and I sure hope this will be, not may be fixed, in a sooner than later version.

Make sure that you do not run Firefox in permanent Private Browsing mode (Never remember history).

• https://support.mozilla.org/kb/Private+Browsing

Start Firefox in Safe Mode to check if one of the extensions (Firefox/Tools > Add-ons > Extensions) or if hardware acceleration is causing the problem.

• Switch to the DEFAULT theme: Firefox/Tools > Add-ons > Appearance
• Do NOT click the Reset button on the Safe Mode start window

• https://support.mozilla.org/kb/Safe+Mode
• https://support.mozilla.org/kb/Troubleshooting+extensions+and+themes