Xmarks is a very useful add-on to safeguard your browser bookmarks by storing a copy of them online in the Xmarks server and synchronize it when ever you make changes to them. If you accidentally deleted one or more important entries, then safely restore them from the last copy stored online.

Xmarks supports all major 4 browsers available in the market now.

Since i am a firefox addict, i will show you how to store, synchronize & restore them simply.

Installing Xmarks

To install Xmarks, visit Xmarks homepage

click on the Firefox icon in the install now box.

On the next page, click “Downlod Xmark for firefox”

Restart firefox for the installation to take effect.

Backing up your Bookmarks

Now let’s push a copy of your bookmarks in to the Xmarks server now.

Goto Tools> Xmarks > click ‘Syncronize now‘

The synchronization process….

So now you have an up to date copy of your bookmarks at the Xmarks server.

Synchronizing your Bookmarks

Remember, Whenever you made changes to your bookmarks for example, a new item added or an exisiting item deleted, you can simply do a synchronization by repeating the above process.
Alternativly, Xmarks will run the synchronization process  every time when you close the browser.

Restore your Bookmarks

Assume you formatted your pc and wiped out all the bookmarks or accidentally deleted an important Bookmark entry!. Now you don’t need to scratch you head any more. You can simply restore your bookmarks from the last replica stored at Xmarks.

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To restore …

Method 1

Goto Tools -> Xmarks -> Click ‘Xmarks Settings‘

From the Xmarkx settings window (shown below), Click the Restore Button. Now you will be provided the list of backups you have in there server. To restore, just click the last backup and click the  ‘Restore Bookmarks‘ button.

Now you can see a last copy of your bookmarks has been successfully restored. Simply click ‘Bookmarks ‘ menu in the  firefox to view them.

Method 2

There is an alternative method of restoring the bookmarks by visiting the Xmarks website.

Visit Xmarks
Login to Xmarks
Click “My Bookmarks” from the menu in the top right corner

Now your bookmarks from the last backup listed there.

Now, from the menu in that webpage,

Click Tools -> click “Explore & Restore old bookmarks”
Simply Select your last backup and click ‘Restore‘ from the menu.

Remember, the process is not yet over. You will get a message box now as shown below.

The message says, it will restore your bookmarks when the next synchronization process occur. This mean, it will happen when you shutdown your browser after this session. But you can still force a synchronization by simply going to Tools -> Xmarks -> click ‘Synchronize Now‘.

Now you will get another message box ask weather to merge the backup in the server with your current bookmarks or Download the copy and overwrite the current one in your pc.

I will simply say ‘Download‘

Your bookmarks are now restored. Hope you enjoy the tutorial.