where is safari search history stored

How to view and clear your web browsing history in Safari on iPhone or iPad

Easily wipe your browsing history in Apple's Safari web browser in seconds.

How to find your web-browsing history

How to clear your web browsing history.

Clearing your browsing history on iPhone and iPad in Safari has been a straightforward affair for years now.

Sometimes, you may want a fresh start with your web browsing — perhaps to get rid of some history that may bring up a memory you'd rather forget as you type in a website URL in the address bar.

Apple makes this feature very easy to access on both the iPhone and iPad by offering two ways to clear your history. So with this in mind, here's how you can do just that and make a fresh start in Safari .

Viewing your web history in iOS 17 and iPadOS 17 is very easy to do — and it's all done from Safari.

• In Safari, tap the Bookmarks button in the toolbar that's below the address bar.
• Tap the History icon in the upper right corner. Here, you can view your entire web history.

• Use the History search bar to find previously viewed pages.

If the time calls to wipe most or all of your web browsing history in Safari, here's how to do it on both iPhone and iPad.

To note, the below steps will be the same if you attempt to wipe your web browsing history on an iPhone 15 Pro Max , and an iPad Mini 6 for example.

• In Safari, tap the Bookmarks button.
• Select the History icon in the upper right corner.
• Tap Clear and select how much history you'd like to clear: the last hour, the last day, 48 hours' worth, or all recorded history.

One more thing… A feature no one talks about

Privacy on the web matters more than ever in these modern times. Websites store the pages you click on, especially when you sign into a page that can contain personal information about you.

Master your iPhone in minutes

iMore offers spot-on advice and guidance from our team of experts, with decades of Apple device experience to lean on. Learn more with iMore!

It's great to have a feature like this in Safari — but it would be good to have this automated. To tell Apple's web browser to automatically clear history after 24 hours would be very useful, as you wouldn't leave a trail behind.

Regardless, it's still a good feature, and one you should use every week.

Daryl is iMore's Features Editor, overseeing long-form and in-depth articles and op-eds. Daryl loves using his experience as both a journalist and Apple fan to tell stories about Apple's products and its community, from the apps we use everyday to the products that have been long forgotten in the Cupertino archives.

Previously Software & Downloads Writer at TechRadar, and Deputy Editor at StealthOptional, he's also written a book, ' The Making of Tomb Raider ', which tells the story of the beginnings of Lara Croft and the series' early development. He's also written for many other publications including WIRED, MacFormat, Bloody Disgusting, VGC, GamesRadar, Nintendo Life, VRV Blog, The Loop Magazine, SUPER JUMP, Gizmodo, Film Stories, TopTenReviews, Miketendo64 and Daily Star.

• Bryan M Wolfe Staff Writer

The four products Apple is going to announce at its May 7 iPad event (and two it definitely isn't)

How to fix iPhone Face ID passcode prompts, HEIF on Android, and more: Your Genius Bar problems, solved!

New Apple Pencil report makes it sound like the PS5 controller - no, really

Most Popular

• 2 iPad Pro M3 (2024): Everything you need to know
• 3 Apple could be springing a big surprise with M4 chip debut on iPad Pro
• 4 Apple has realized what the iPad's best feature is after 14 years
• 5 Mimestream, my favorite Mac email app, is getting an iOS version

Tips & Tricks

Troubleshooting, how to access & search safari history on mac.

Just about all modern web browsers default to maintaining a history log of your web browsing activity, and Safari for Mac is no different. This article will focus on how to access your Safari history on the Mac, and also how to search Safari browsing history for specific words, terms, and matches.

Accessing and searching through Safari browser history can be helpful for tracking down websites or articles that were previously visited on a particular topic but that you’ve since forgotten, retrieving previously visited websites, looking for a particular match, amongst many other valid uses for individual users, parents, public computers, information security, systems administrators, and much more.

Searching Safari web browsing history on a Mac is easy, here’s how it works:

How to Search Safari History on Mac

• Open the Safari web browser on the Mac if you have not done so already
• Pull down the “History” menu and choose “Show All History”

• You’ll now be presented with all stored Safari History of web browsing activity, with each browsing history session separated by date
• Click into the search box seen in the upper right corner of the History screen

• Type in any word, term, or phrase to search the Safari History for, any matches will be shown on screen

In the example here, we searched for the term “Chromebook” and Safari returned all matches for that term.

Safari History Search will find matches as far back as possible, searching through all Safari history for the current Mac user. Anything matching will be returned as a search result.

Searching browser history can be helpful for many reasons, whether you’re trying to recall something you were looking at some time ago, or you want to find a website or article about a particular topic you know you have visited before. Of course searching through web browser history can also be useful for forensic purposes and data auditing too, for those involved in fields where that can be necessary or relevant.

Safari will store browser history for as long as you have been using Safari, unless it has been cleared specifically. There are multiple options for clearing Safari history, and if you want to completely clear all history in Safari on the Mac that is possible. You can also prevent browser history from being stored in the first place by choosing to use Private Browsing mode in Safari for Mac , which doesn’t store local browsing session data or cookies.

Do keep in mind if you (or the target Mac) run multiple different versions of Safari, like Safari alongside Safari Tech Preview, then you’d need to check history in both Safari browsers, and likewise you’d want to clear history in both of them too if you were wanting to clear our history for whatever reason.

The capability to find and look through past browsing data is not unique to the Mac, you can also search Safari browsing history on the iPhone and iPad too, and virtually every other modern web browser also has the same capability, except for most TOR browsers and privacy centric apps like Firefox Focus.

Enjoy this tip? Subscribe to our newsletter!

Get more of our great Apple tips, tricks, and important news delivered to your inbox with the OSXDaily newsletter. 

You have successfully joined our subscriber list.

Related articles:

• How to Recover Deleted Safari History on Mac
• How to Delete Specific Safari History on Mac
• View Browsing History on iPhone, iPad, iPod touch from Safari
• How to Clear Google Maps Search History on iPhone & iPad

» Comments RSS Feed

My safari on my MacBook Pro is getting buggy and a lot of things aren’t working, like I can’t click on an email address to start an email from the mail program, I click and nothing happens. Now I am trying to find a web page from a few days ago, so I try to go to ‘show all history’ but nothing happens. I can’t get my history to show in the browser!! It does have recent history, it’s just that I can’t access my whole history like I should be able to. What gives?

I used to use history a lot when I created a search in Safari. After going to a website that lead to further exploration it would sometimes take clicking the back arrow several times to get back to the original search and it was quicker to go to history and just click on the original search. Since one of the recent updates I have been unable to find the original searches any more. I don’t know if I am just not seeing it or if it isn’t there. Anyone else have this problem?

I have asked this before but I’m asking it again. It is possible to make a guide on how to go to root and _delete_ the option “new private window” from the File dropdown menu? How to edit the nib file etc…

You can Enable Parental Controls on Mac and that can be used to disable Safari Private Mode.

Or this below, which I found on the web and would not recommend to anyone:

If logging isn’t practical or you want to be more proactive and prevent Private Browsing from being accessible in the first place, it is possible (though not a short process) to disable Private Browsing if you are willing to mess with Safari’s internal files.

Note that macOS 10.12+ will not allow you to modify, overwrite, or delete Safari. You can make the following modifications to a copy of Safari and put that version in the Dock, but the original Safari will still need to exist in the Applications folder.

Install the necessary files

Install Xcode (available in the App Store) Download a zip file of Nib-Decompiler from GitHub (or clone the repository if you know how to do that) Open the NibDecompiler.xcodeproj Xcode project in Xcode Compile the project. This will produce a file named NibDecompiler.action. You can now close the project. Copy NibDecompiler.action into ~/Library/Automator* From your download, copy NibDecompiler.workflow into ~/Library/Services* Remove the “New Private Window” option from the menu bar

Note that this involves editing the Safari internal files. You will need to redo these steps every time you update Safari.

Go to Safari in the Finder and right-click “Show Package Contents” This will open the app as if it were a folder. Go to Contents, then Resources, then Base.lproj folder. Find MainMenu.nib. Copy it outside of the package somewhere (like the Desktop). Right-click on the file and choose “NibDecompiler”. The file will be made editable. Open the file in Xcode (should be double-clickable) In the window with the Safari menu, choose “Safari” to expand it. Click on the “New Private Window” menu item. Hit the delete key to see it disappear. Save the file. Back in the Base.lproj folder of the Safari app, make a copy MainMenu.nib just in case something goes wrong and you need to restore it. Copy your edited MainMenu.nib to Base.lproj, overwriting the existing one. Open Safari to make sure that it still opens (if it doesn’t, restore your original MainMenu.nib file). (Optional) If everything works, you may delete the backup MainMenu.nib if you so choose. By removing the “New Private Window” menu item from the menu bar, they will not be able to enter private browsing. Additionally, keyboard shortcuts are tied to menu items, so that’s disabled too.

* ~ means your user home directory. Library is a hidden folder that isn’t visible when you navigate to the home directory. You can get to this folder in the Finder by going to the “Go” menu and choosing “Connect to Folder…”, then typing in ~/Library. You will then see the folders you need to copy files to.

Instructions copied from this MacRumors forum thread ( https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/how-to-disable-private-browsing-in-safari.175238/page-3#post-23387488 )

You can see things you wish you didn’t see by doing this on someone elses computer!

You can find cold things in their refrigerators, too, genius.

Leave a Reply

Name (required)

Mail (will not be published) (required)

Subscribe to OSXDaily

• - What do Blue Underlines on Text Mean in Microsoft Edge?
• - Fixing Apple Watch False Touch & Ghost Touch Issues
• - How to Connect AirPods to a Smart TV
• - How to Customize the Finder Sidebar on Mac
• - How to Uninstall Apps on MacOS Sonoma & Ventura via System Settings
• - Beta 3 of iOS 17.5, macOS Sonoma 14.5, iPadOS 17.5, Available for Testing
• - Apple Event Set for May 7, New iPads Expected
• - Beta 2 of iOS 17.5, iPadOS 17.5, macOS Sonoma 14.5, Available for Testing
• - Opinion: Shiny Keys on MacBook Air & Pro Are Ugly and Shouldn’t Happen
• - MacOS Ventura 13.6.6 & Safari 17.4.1 Update Available

iPhone / iPad

• - How to Use the Latest GPT 4 & DALL-E 3 Free on iPhone & iPad with Copilot
• - How to Bulk Image Edit on iPhone & iPad wth Copy & Paste Edits to Photos
• - What Does the Bell with Line Through It Mean in Messages? Bell Icon on iPhone, iPad, & Mac Explained
• - iOS 16.7.7 & iPadOS 16.7.7 Released for Older iPhone & iPad Models
• - Fix a Repeating “Trust This Computer” Alert on iPhone & iPad
• - Make a Website Your Mac Wallpaper with Plash
• - 15 Mail Keyboard Shortcuts for Mac
• - How to Use Hover Text on Mac to Magnify On-Screen Text
• - What’s a PXM File & How Do You Open It?
• - Fix “warning: unable to access /Users/Name/.config/git/attributes Permission Denied” Errors

About OSXDaily | Contact Us | Privacy Policy | Sitemap

This website is unrelated to Apple Inc

All trademarks and copyrights on this website are property of their respective owners.

© 2024 OS X Daily. All Rights Reserved. Reproduction without explicit permission is prohibited.

How To Check Safari History on iPhone and Mac [2024]

Recently a man in the EU discovered that his Safari browsing history was included in his Apple data download. After I discussed the issue with him and compared my data download, it turns out he received a lot more information than I did.

After this experience, I decided to research and learn different ways to manage your Safari browser history on your Mac and iPhone. But before we dive into this, what exactly is the Safari Browsing History and why is it so important?

How To Check Safari Search History on iPhone?

1.  Open Safari .

2.  In the Menu bar, look at the lower right corner of the screen and tap the History icon.

A Pop-up window showing the list of all the websites you have visited in Safari will appear. Also, If you want to, you can search the history for particular websites, and do this:

3. Enter a phrase into the search bar at the top of the screen.

This filters just the websites with that particular keyword or phrase. It is also important to know how to clear your Safari Browsing History.

To do this, follow these simple steps below.

How To Check Safari Search History on Mac?

There are a number of ways you can manage your browser history for Safari on both your macOS and iOS. Here are different techniques and how you can do it. First, let´s consider how to view your browsing history.

Time needed:  1 minute

View Your Safari Browsing History on Mac

Follow the simple steps below to view your browsing history on your iPhone as well.

Delete Your Safari Browsing History on your Mac

To clear your browser history on Mac, follow these straightforward steps:

1.  Open Safari.

2. Open the  History Bar  at the top of the screen.

3.  Click the Show All History tab in the Menu bar or press Command (⌘) + Y in Safari, which will take you to the history view.

4.  Select Clear History .

A pop-up menu will come up and it will allow you to choose how far back you want to clear the existing history. This option lets you choose if you want to clear your history from the last hour, day, week, two weeks, a month, or even for all time.

5.  Choose your preferred option and click Clear History .

Great! You have successfully cleared your Safari browsing history on Mac. Now, Let´s see how we can do this for iPhone as well.

Delete Your Safari Browsing History on iPhone

Clearing your browsing history on your iPhone is also easy. Follow these simple steps too:

1.  Open the Settings app on your iPhone.

2.  Scroll through the options and click on Safari .

3.  Again, scroll and find the Clear History and Website Data option.

4. Tap Clear History and Data .

Yes! You have successfully cleared all Browsing History on Mac and iPhone.

Following these next easy steps to remove all the records of the web pages or sites you have visited over the selected period.

You can also prevent Safari from tracking your browsing history. Let us quickly dive into this too.

Prevent Safari From Tracking Your Browsing History on Mac

Suppose you prevent Safari from tracking the history of the websites you visited. In that case, it means that Safari cannot save any record of the searches you perform or the websites you visit. How can you do this?

2.  Navigate to click Safari in the Menu Ba r .

3.  Select Preferences from the Menu Ba r .

4.  Next, Click on the Privacy tab.

5. You´ll see a box that is next to Prevent cross-site tracking, Check the box.

Let me also walk you through how to do this on your iPhone.

Prevent Safari From Tracking Your Browsing History on iPhone

1.  Open the Settings  app.

2.  Scroll down to the bottom and tap Safari .

3.  On this page as well, scroll down to the Privacy and Security section .

4.  Toggle on the switch that is next to the Prevent Cross-Site Tracking .

You have successfully prevented Safari from tracking your browsing history both on your Mac and iPhone!

If you prefer additional protection for your browsing activity and for your iPhone and Mac overall, we recommend a dedicated antivirus like Intego Internet Security that can block malicious websites from accessing your data.

That is not all. Sometimes, you might not want your Safari Browser to save your browsing history, website data, or even cookies. Using the private browsing mode is the solution to this.

Keep Your Browsing History Private on Mac

To keep your browsing history private on Mac, you need to use the private browsing mode. Follow these very easy and straightforward steps to do this:

2. Look at the top of your screen, select File , and click New Private Window .

A new window will be opened and this will disallow Safari from saving your Browsing or search history.

This would also restrict Safari from sending auto-fill information to any website you visit while using the window. You can also do the same on your iPhone.

Keep Your Browsing History Private on iPhone

2.  Tap the Page tab in the bottom right corner of the Safari screen.

3. Switch the page option to Private .

4. Finally, Click the ‘+’ sign at the bottom left corner to open a new private browser.

Keeping your browsing history private is very important, but in some situations, you may have visited a website by mistake or you don´t want another person to see that you visited the website. In this situation, the best thing you should do is delete the individual website from your Browsing history. Let me quickly show you how to do this:

Delete Individual Websites From Your Browsing History for Mac

To delete individual items or websites from your Safari Browsing history, follow these very easy steps:

1.  Open your Safari Browser .

2.  Click on the History tab in the Menu bar

3.  Select the Show All History tab

4.  Find the website you want to remove and Right-click   on it.

5.  Select the Delete from History option.

Let me quickly walk you through how to do this on iPhone as well.

Delete Individual Websites From Your Browsing History for iPhone

1.  Open the Safari app.

2.  Click the history tab at the bottom right corner of the screen of the browser.

3.  Look for the website you want to delete from your history and swipe left on it.

4.  Finally, Tap the Delete  option.

Yeah! You have successfully deleted individual websites from your browsing history. But if you use Safari on multiple devices of yours such as iPhone, Mac, and maybe your iPad, iCloud sync can help you to keep all your history synchronized across all the devices you own. This means that you can start browsing on your iPhone and continue later on your Mac. Let me quickly show you how to set this up.

Manage Your Safari Browsing History Across Multiple Devices Using iCloud Sync

To use the iCloud sync feature, you must have iCloud enabled on all the devices you own and they all need to be signed in to the iCloud with the same Apple ID.

If you have Safari iCloud syncing turned on and you clear your history, it will also be cleared from all of your other Apple devices with iCloud sync enabled. How can you enable and disable iCloud sync for your Safari browsing history on your Mac and iPhone?

Manage Your Safari Browsing History Across Multiple Devices Using iCloud Sync on Mac

2. Select Safari > Preferences > iCloud Option

4. Check the checkbox next to Safari to make sure that it syncs across all your devices

To sync your browsing history across certain devices, do this:

5. Click on the Manage Devices Button and select the devices you want to sync with.

6. Click Done  

Manage Your Safari Browsing History Across Multiple Devices Using iCloud Sync on iPhone

1. Open the Settings app on your iPhone.

2.  Click on your name at the top of the settings screen.

3.  Tap the iCloud option.

4.  Under Apps Using iCloud , select Safari.

5.  Finally, toggle on the switch next to Safari.

Great! You have successfully enabled iCloud sync for Safari browsing history and it will be updated on all your devices using the same Apple ID when you visit new websites or close an existing Safari tab.

Suppose you’ve carefully followed the methods and steps I’ve provided in this step-by-step guide. In that case, you will have a great edge over efficiently managing your Safari browsing history on one or even multiple devices.

Which of these methods worked for you?  Feel free to share your thoughts here in the comment section. Also, if you are having problems with iCloud syncing on your devices, check out our guide for effective solutions.

One thought on “ How To Check Safari History on iPhone and Mac [2024] ”

I like to use imymac——Browser Cleaner to clean up browser traces, historical records, etc.Browser Cleanup lets you clean up junk files, cookies, and history, eliminate deceleration reasons, clear privacy traces to protect your confidential data and more. It is performed on Mac OS and Mac OS X.

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

You must be logged in to post a comment.

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed .

• Amalia Souris

• PC & Mobile

How To View History in Safari on a PC, Tablet, or Mobile Device

Lee Stanton Lee Stanton is a versatile writer with a concentration on the software landscape, covering both mobile and desktop applications as well as online technologies. Read more July 19, 2022

Device Links

• Device Missing?

Safari for iOS provides a convenient way to keep track of your browsing history. You can use it to call up web pages quickly you’ve visited. You can easily go down the rabbit hole when performing searches online. This makes it difficult to remember exactly where you found a valuable piece of information. Reviewing your browsing history can retrace your steps, saving you the arduous task of finding the data from scratch. This article covers how to see your history in Safari. Check out how to do that below.

How to View History in Safari on an iPhone

Safari stores your browser activity, making it possible to revisit sites at a later date. You could either view your most recent history or check out the entire list of previously visited websites. This is how to do that.

You have now accessed your recent history on Safari.

If you would like to view your complete Safari browsing history, here’s how to do that.

You’ve now accessed your Safari browsing history.

How to View History in Safari on an iPad

Safari allows users to keep track of their browsing history. This feature can then be used to revisit sites that might be of interest. You could either view recent history or peruse all your browsing data. The steps listed here detail how to do that.

You have now viewed the recent history on your iPad.

To view your complete browsing data, follow the steps outlined here.

How to View History in Safari on a Mac

Your Safari browsing history allows you to revisit sites you viewed in the past. You can even use the search tool so that you don’t have to scroll through the entire list of results to find what you are looking for. Here’s how to view your browsing history on an iPhone.

• Click on it to open the page in your browser.

You can now see your history in Safari. If you signed in to your device using the same Apple ID that you use on your other Apple devices, that history would also be displayed on your Mac.

Can You View History From Private Browsing?

Private Browsing is a feature that prevents Safari from storing information on sites you have visited. It ensures there’s no record of your online activity, including passwords or autofill information. It also prevents iCloud from storing data on any tabs that you open. To provide an additional layer of privacy, Safari prevents sites and content providers from tracking you. Any cookies you might have picked up are deleted once you close the tab.

This means that Safari doesn’t store your browsing history when you activate Private Browsing. You will therefore be unable to view it in the future.

How to Clear History in Safari

If your Apple device is lagging or otherwise misbehaving, you might consider clearing your browsing data. This is how to do that.

Your browsing data will now be removed from your device.

Retracing Your Steps

Like many web browsers, Safari stores information on websites you’ve visited. This data can come in handy when you want to go back to a particular site. This guide shows you how to retrieve the browsing history stored on your Apple devices.

Have you viewed your browsing history on Safari? What did you think of the process? Let us know in the comments below.

Related Posts

Disclaimer: Some pages on this site may include an affiliate link. This does not effect our editorial in any way.

Parth Shah February 29, 2024

Lee Stanton February 23, 2024

Lee Stanton February 19, 2024

Send To Someone

Missing device.

Please enable JavaScript to submit this form.

• Get One: Tornado Alert Apps
• The Best Tech Gifts Under $100

Managing History and Other Private Data in Safari for macOS

Erase your web history from your Mac's hard drive

In This Article

Jump to a Section

What Types of Data Does Safari Save?

• Manage Browser Data
• Delete the Browsing History on a Mac Hard Drive

Automatically Delete History and Other Private Data

Safari private browsing mode.

When you use the default Safari browser on your Mac , your browsing history is stored on the hard drive along with cookies , saved passwords, and other personal settings. It's easy to erase your Safari history and other private browsing data. You can also use the Safari Private Browsing mode to prevent this information from being saved in the first place.

Instructions in this article apply to the Safari web browser for macOS 10.15 ( Catalina ), 10.14 (Mojave), and 10.13 (High Sierra).

Safari saves the following data to improve your future browsing experience by speeding up page load times, reducing the amount of typing required, and more:

• Browsing history : Each time you visit a website, Safari stores a record of the page name and  URL .
• Cache : Speeds up page loads on subsequent visits. The cache includes image files and other web page components.
• Cookies : Cookies from web servers are stored on your hard drive as small text files. Websites use cookies to customize your browsing experience. Login credentials and other private data are sometimes stored in cookies.
• Download history : Each time a file downloads through the browser, Safari stores a record containing the file name, size, and the date and time of the download.
• Local storage : Sites coded with HTML 5 store web application data locally without using cookies.

To save space on your hard drive, enable Safari in the iCloud preferences to store browser data in the cloud instead.

How to Manage Browser Data in Safari

To manage stored website data on your Mac's hard drive:

Go to Safari > Preferences .

You can also access Safari Preferences using the keyboard shortcut Command + , (comma).

Select  Privacy in the Preferences interface.

Select  Manage Website Data.

You'll see a list of sites that stored data on your hard drive. Below each site's name is a summary of the type of data that was stored. To delete a site's data from your Mac's hard drive, choose it from the list and select  Remove .

Select  Remove All Website Data to delete your browsing history, cookies, and other web data from your hard drive.

How to Delete the Browsing History on a Mac Hard Drive

To remove browsing history and website data by time period, go to  Safari >  Clear History and Website Data and choose from one of the following options:

• The last hour
• Today and yesterday
• All history

History and website data does not include saved usernames, passwords, and other Safari AutoFill information.

You can also instruct the browser to delete browsing data automatically after a specified period of time:

Select General .

Choose a time period under Remove history items and Remove download list items .

Only your browsing and download histories are removed. Cache, cookies, and other website data isn't affected.

In Private Browsing mode, your personal data isn't saved. To activate Private Browsing mode, select  File  > New Private Window . Alternatively, open a private window in Safari on Mac using the keyboard shortcut Shift + Command + N .

When you use the web in a private window, items such as browsing history, cache , cookies, and AutoFill information aren't stored on your hard drive at the end of a browsing session. If you didn't designate a window as private, any browsing data accumulated within it is saved   on your hard drive.

Enabling Private Browsing mode in previous versions of Safari encompassed all open windows and tabs. To determine whether or not a window is private, look at the address bar. If it contains a black background with white text, Private Browsing mode is active in that window. If it contains a white background with dark text, it isn't enabled.

Using Private Browsing and clearing your history doesn't prevent websites and your ISP from collecting personal data from you.

Get the Latest Tech News Delivered Every Day

• How to Manage History and Browsing Data on iPhone
• How to Manage Your Browsing History in Safari
• How to Clear Search History on iPhone
• Manage and Delete Browsing Data in Microsoft Edge
• Manage Browsing History and Private Data in Firefox
• How to Manage Browsing History on Safari for iPad
• Manage Browsing History and Other Private Data in IE 11
• How to Clear Private Data, Caches, and Cookies on Mac
• Use Private Browsing Mode in Opera for Desktop
• How to Clear the Browsing History in Chrome for iPad
• 10 Hidden Features in macOS Sonoma
• How to Delete Cookies in Every Major Browser
• What Is Safari?
• How to Turn on Incognito Mode in Chrome, Edge, Firefox, Safari and Opera
• How to Turn On Private Browsing in Safari for iOS
• How to Clear Cookies and Cache in Chrome

You are using an outdated browser. Please upgrade your browser to improve your experience.

How to clear browsing history on Safari on iPhone or Mac

You can clear your Safari browsing history on both iOS and Mac

As tracking goes, Safari keeping your browsing history is less about privacy-busting security and more about just being useful. It's your history that means Safari remembers where to go to when you choose forward and back within a site, for instance.

It's also how Safari is able to offer you a list of sites that you regularly go to, on account of how handy it is to be able to back to them with a click. History also does keep things you may not expect, though, such as a list of items you've downloaded.

If you don't want that, though, or you're just fed up of Safari going to site addresses you haven't looked at in years, you can wipe the whole browsing history.

On a Mac, you can also wipe, for instance, just the last hour's browsing history. So if you share Safari and it's someone's special birthday coming up, you can avoid them inadvertently finding out you plan to surprise them with dance lessons.

How to clear search history on Safari on Mac

• In Safari, choose the History menu
• Select Clear History from the very bottom of the menu
• In the dialog box that appears, choose from clearing the last hour , today , today and yesterday , or all history
• Click on Clear History

Alternatively, within Safari you can press Command-Y and the current page will be replaced by a history list. There's a Clear History... button toward the top right.

Clicking on that gives you exactly the same dialog about choosing how far back you want to clear your browsing history. But this page does also give you one extra option — the ability to delete one specific item.

How to clear one item from Safari search history on Mac

• In Safari, press Command-Y
• From the long list, click once on a history item to select it
• Right-click to bring up a menu, then choose Delete

Alternatively, if you select one, two, or more items in the history list, you can then press the Delete key to remove them all.

That kind of precision removal is only possible on your Mac, not on iOS . However, whether it's precision or wholesale clearing of your history, though, there is a way to replicate it on iOS.

If you have set iCloud to share your Safari history, then just doing this on your Mac also removes the history from your iPhone, and iPad.

Otherwise, you're stuck with going to your iOS device. And then with clearing the entire history.

How to clear search history on iPhone

• Go to Settings on your iOS device
• Tap on Safari
• Scroll down to Clear History and Website Data
• Tap that, then tap Clear History and Data to confirm

One important thing to note is that you can't selectively remove, say, today's browsing history on the iPhone or iPad . It's all or nothing, with iOS.

What you leave behind

Clearing your history like this does remove the list of sites and pages you've visited. It does mean you can't go back to that site you read last Tuesday, not without remembering what it was and going there yourself.

What it doesn't remove, though, is the information that gets used by something like AutoFill. If you have your address, for instance, and you're used to online forms being filled out with it, you've still got that feature.

You've also still got anything you downloaded. It's purely that Safari won't keep the list of downloads.

Keep up with AppleInsider by downloading the AppleInsider app for iOS, and follow us on YouTube , Twitter @appleinsider and Facebook for live, late-breaking coverage. You can also check out our official Instagram account for exclusive photos.

Top Stories

Amazon discounts the Apple Studio Display to $1,299.97 ($300 off)

New iPad Pro unexpectedly rumored to debut with M4 chip

Retro gold rush: these emulators are coming to the App Store soon

The Worst of WWDC - Apple's biggest missteps on the way to success

Apple said to have restarted discussion for OpenAI integration into iOS 18

New iPad Air & iPad Pro models are coming soon - what to expect

Featured deals.

Save up to $350 on every Apple M3 MacBook Pro, plus get up to $80 off AppleCare

Latest comparisons.

M3 15-inch MacBook Air vs M3 14-inch MacBook Pro — Ultimate buyer's guide

M3 MacBook Air vs M1 MacBook Air — Compared

M3 MacBook Air vs M2 MacBook Air — Compared

Latest news.

Crime blotter: NYPD officer acquitted for 2021 punch in Apple Store

In this week's look at the Apple crime blotter, Canadian Police are looking into iPhone thefts, fraud has been alleged in third-party Apple Store pick-ups, an iPhone was stolen in a viral video, and more!

New iPhone 16 leak blows the cover off of screen sizes & camera bump

Frequent leaker Sonny Dickson has revealed a photo purporting to show the forthcoming iPhone 16 lineup, and the screen sizes for each of the four models.

Amazon discounts the Apple Studio Display to $1,299 ($300 off)

Save $300 on the Apple Studio Display at Amazon this weekend, with prices dropping to as low as $1,299.97 (the lowest price on record).

Apple Pencil coming on May 7 could buzz users with haptic feedback

The next generation of Apple Pencil could have haptic feedback, buzzing a user's fingers as they draw and write.

New iPad Pro rumored to debut with M4 chip

A new rumor claims that the forthcoming iPad Pro, scheduled to debut on May 7, could be the first Apple product with the next-generation M4 chip powering it.

Some users are randomly getting locked out of their Apple ID accounts

Overnight, a notable portion of iCloud users were getting logged out of their accounts across all of their devices, and the only way back in was to perform a password reset.

A report suggests that Apple is still looking across the spectrum of AI providers for iOS 18, with OpenAi again in conversations with the iPhone maker.

Apple is allowing emulators to be submitted to the App Store. Here's what's on the way so you can play your favorite retro games on your iPhone.

Apple finally pulls generative AI nude apps from the App Store

Apple has removed apps from the App Store that claimed to make nonconsensual nude imagery, a move that demonstrates Apple is now more willing to tackle the hazardous app category.

ByteDance would rather shut down US TikTok than sell it

TikTok owner ByteDance reportedly will not sell to a US firm if it is unable to convince a court to overturn President Biden's day-old law forcing a sale or ban.

Latest Videos

All of the specs of the iPhone SE 4 may have just been leaked

When to expect every Mac to get the AI-based M4 processor

Latest reviews.

Unistellar Odyssey Pro review: Unlock pro-level astronomy with your iPhone from your backyard

Ugreen DXP8800 Plus network attached storage review: Good hardware, beta software

Espresso 17 Pro review: Magnetic & modular portable Mac monitor

{{ title }}

{{ summary }}

• PRO Courses Guides New Tech Help Pro Expert Videos About wikiHow Pro Upgrade Sign In
• EDIT Edit this Article
• EXPLORE Tech Help Pro About Us Random Article Quizzes Request a New Article Community Dashboard This Or That Game Popular Categories Arts and Entertainment Artwork Books Movies Computers and Electronics Computers Phone Skills Technology Hacks Health Men's Health Mental Health Women's Health Relationships Dating Love Relationship Issues Hobbies and Crafts Crafts Drawing Games Education & Communication Communication Skills Personal Development Studying Personal Care and Style Fashion Hair Care Personal Hygiene Youth Personal Care School Stuff Dating All Categories Arts and Entertainment Finance and Business Home and Garden Relationship Quizzes Cars & Other Vehicles Food and Entertaining Personal Care and Style Sports and Fitness Computers and Electronics Health Pets and Animals Travel Education & Communication Hobbies and Crafts Philosophy and Religion Work World Family Life Holidays and Traditions Relationships Youth
• Browse Articles
• Learn Something New
• Quizzes Hot
• This Or That Game New
• Train Your Brain
• Explore More
• Support wikiHow
• About wikiHow
• Log in / Sign up
• Computers and Electronics
• Internet Browsers
• Safari Browser

2 Simple Ways to Clear Safari Search History

Last Updated: November 28, 2023 Fact Checked

This article was written by Gonzalo Martinez and by wikiHow staff writer, Rain Kengly . Gonzalo Martinez is the President of CleverTech, a tech repair business in San Jose, California founded in 2014. CleverTech LLC specializes in repairing Apple products. CleverTech pursues environmental responsibility by recycling aluminum, display assemblies, and the micro components on motherboards to reuse for future repairs. On average, they save 2 lbs - 3 lbs more electronic waste daily than the average computer repair store. This article has been fact-checked, ensuring the accuracy of any cited facts and confirming the authority of its sources. This article has been viewed 506,707 times.

Do you need to delete searches that pop up when you click Safari's URL bar? Whether you want to delete Safari history on your Mac computer or iPhone, you can do this in a few simple steps.

• This will remove all history, cookies, and other browsing data from Safari.

• If you choose to leave this on, Safari will suggest searches more often as your browser history builds.

• You can choose: the last hour , today , today and yesterday , or all history .

Troubleshooting Safari History Data

• Go to Settings → Screen Time → Turn Off Screen Time .
• You can turn Screen Time back on after you have successfully cleared your history.

• For iOS, go to Settings , then click your Apple ID . Click iCloud and toggle Safari off.
• For Mac, go to System Preferences → iCloud . Uncheck the box for Safari .
• Clear your Safari history following the steps above.

• To restart an iPhone without a home button, press and hold the lock button and top volume button for at least five seconds. Slide to power off. After a few minutes, hold the power button to turn it on.
• To restart an iPhone with a home button, press and hold the lock button and home button for at least five seconds. Slide to power off. After a few minutes, hold the power button to turn it on.
• To restart a Mac , click the Apple icon in the top left. In the drop-down menu, click Restart… . It will power on again automatically.

Community Q&A

You Might Also Like

• ↑ https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT201265
• ↑ https://support.apple.com/guide/safari/clear-your-browsing-history-sfri47acf5d6/mac
• ↑ https://support.apple.com/lv-lv/guide/safari/ibrwe75c2a3c/mac
• ↑ https://appletoolbox.com/cant-delete-safari-history-on-iphone-ipad-fix/#Why_cant_I_clear_Safari_history_and_website_data_on_my_iPhone_or_iPad

About This Article

1. Open Safari. 2. Click the URL bar. 3. Delete anything in the bar. 4. Click Clear Recent Searches . Did this summary help you? Yes No

• Send fan mail to authors

Reader Success Stories

Sep 30, 2016

Is this article up to date?

Featured Articles

Trending Articles

Watch Articles

• Terms of Use
• Privacy Policy
• Do Not Sell or Share My Info
• Not Selling Info

Keep up with the latest tech with wikiHow's free Tech Help Newsletter

How to clear Safari browsing history on iPhone and iPad

Clear Safari browsing history on iPhone and iPad in a few simple steps

You'll definitely want to know how to clear Safari browsing history on iPhone and iPad . Know how to delete browsing history is part of basic user operation on all your devices, and is especially if you share devices with others. 

Luckily, deleting browsing history on Safari is easy and can be done in just a few taps, and is the same on iOS and iPadOS, so whether you're using an iPhone 15 Pro or an iPad Air , these steps will apply.

Remember, though, that deleting your browsing history only stops your activity being visible on that device. Your Internet Service Provider (ISP) will still be able to see the webpages you have visited. If you want to stop that, for ultimate privacy, you'll need to use one of the best VPN services .

The following screenshots were taken on an iPhone running iOS 17 . If you aren't running the latest version of your device's OS, we can show you how to update an iPhone or how to update an iPad .

• In Safari, tap the book icon
• Go to the history tab (clock)
• Select how far back to clear

Read on to see full illustrated instructions.

1. In Safari, tap the book icon

Firstly, open Safari and tap the book icon in the bottom bar.

2. Select the history tab (clock icon) and tap Clear

Now select the history tab (clock icon) and tap Clear at the bottom.

3. Select how far back to clear and tap Delete

Now choose how far back you'd like to delete : last hour, today, today and yesterday, or all time.

If you like, you can toggle on Close All Tabs , which will close every open tab that isn't in a tab group (we can show you how to use tab groups if you aren't sure).

Finally, when you're happy, hit Delete .

As you can see in the screenshot above, if you now go back to the history tab, your history will have been deleted.

For more iPhone tutorials, check out our guides on how to transfer data from iPhone to iPhone , how to clear RAM on iPhone , how to delete multiple contacts on iPhone and how to rearrange the iOS 17 Messages '+' menu .

Sign up to get the BEST of Tom’s Guide direct to your inbox.

Upgrade your life with a daily dose of the biggest tech news, lifestyle hacks and our curated analysis. Be the first to know about cutting-edge gadgets and the hottest deals.

Peter is Reviews Editor at Tom's Guide. As a writer, he covers topics including tech, photography, gaming, hardware, motoring and food & drink. Outside of work, he's an avid photographer, specialising in architectural and portrait photography. When he's not snapping away on his beloved Fujifilm camera, he can usually be found telling everyone about his greyhounds, riding his motorcycle, squeezing as many FPS as possible out of PC games, and perfecting his espresso shots. 

Forget the iPad — it's the iPhone 16 Pro that needs Apple Pencil 3 support

Google Maps on iPhone may finally get this useful navigation feature

Samsung Galaxy Watch 7 Ultra reportedly on the way as blood sugar monitoring rumors ramp up

Most Popular

• 2 'Bridgerton' showrunner teases which sibling will be the focus of season 4
• 3 Nintendo Switch 2 leak teases big Joy-Con upgrade and good news for Pro controller owners
• 4 Massive Best Buy weekend sale is live — here’s 17 deals I’d get on OLED TVs, headphones, laptops and more
• 5 New Google Pixel 8a leaked renders leave absolutely nothing to the imagination

How to search your browsing history on an iPhone, in Safari or Google Chrome

• It's easy to search the history on your iPhone's web browser to return to a specific webpage you've visited previously. 
• You can search the history on your iPhone in the Safari or Google Chrome browsers with these steps. 
• Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

The search history on your iPhone's web browser can be helpful in taking you back to a site you want to see again, but scrolling through the whole list can be time consuming and annoying. 

Luckily, there's a search tool to help you get back to websites you may have visited a while ago — without going through the trouble of trying to remember the date you visited it. 

This feature is available on both the Safari and Google Chrome browsers. Here's how to use it to search your web history on an iPhone . 

Check out the products mentioned in this article:

Iphone 11 (from $699.99 at best buy), how to search the history on your iphone in safari .

1. Open the Safari app.

2. Tap the book icon at the bottom of your screen. It is the second icon from the right. This will bring up your search history.

3. Pull down on this History menu to reveal a bar at the top labeled "Search History" with a magnifying glass to the left of it.

4. Tap the search bar you just revealed to bring up the keypad, and type your search query. The query doesn't have to be exact to bring up results.

5. The result you are looking for should appear. Tap it to return to the website you visited.

How to search history on your iPhone in Google Chrome

1. Open the Google Chrome app.

2. Tap the three dots in the bottom right hand corner of the screen. This will bring up an options menu.

3. Tap "History," which is the second to last option on the list of items in blue. The icon looks like a clock with an arrow around the outside pointing counterclockwise.

4. On the new History page, tap the search bar at the top to bring up your keyboard.

5. Type your search query into the search bar. 

6. Tap the name of the site you were looking for. This will bring you back to the page.

Related coverage from How To Do Everything: Tech :

How to close all of the open tabs on your iphone's safari browser at once, how to stop pop-ups from appearing on your iphone's safari browser, how to add bookmarks and favorites on an iphone's safari browser for quick access to your preferred webpages, how to clear the safari search history on your iphone in three different ways.

On February 28, Axel Springer, Business Insider's parent company, joined 31 other media groups and filed a $2.3 billion suit against Google in Dutch court, alleging losses suffered due to the company's advertising practices.

Insider Inc. receives a commission when you buy through our links.

Watch: I'm a diehard iPhone user who switched to Android for a week — here's what I loved and hated about the Google Pixel 3 XL

• Main content

How-To Geek

Does clearing your browser history really delete it.

You spend some time surfing the web, close your browser, and clear your internet history.

Quick Links

Recovering deleted files, inspecting the dns cache, router logs, what doesn't work, where else can my history be recovered from.

You spend some time surfing the web, close your browser, and clear your internet history.  But is your history really deleted, and is there any way to find out what websites you visited?  Read on to see several ways that your deleted browser history can be recovered.

Your browser history is stored just like everything else on your computer, as a file (or collection of files).  Clearing your browser history merely deletes these files from your hard drive.  We've written a guide on recovering deleted files that can be used to also recover your browser cache; you just need to know where your browser cache is stored.

Internet Explorer: C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\History

Mozilla Firefox: C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Roaming\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\<profile folder>

Google Chrome: C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Local\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default

In all of those directories, replace <username> with the name of the user whose history you wish to recover.  Set your recovery software to scan those directories in order to recover history.  If you try to browse to any of those folders, you may need to configure explorer to show hidden files .

Your computer uses DNS servers to resolve hostnames to IP addresses , and these queries are temporarily stored in your DNS cache.  When you clear your browser history, your DNS cache is not touched.

To see the list of cached website lookups for your system:

Open a command prompt by typing "cmd" into the start menu.

Then, issue this command:

ipconfig /displaydns

As you can see in the screenshot above, the DNS cache reveals that we have visited howtogeek.com recently.  Now, there are a few big caveats to using this approach, so you can't rely on it as catch-all method for viewing the sites you (or someone else) have visited.

First off, your browser is not the only thing that can cause a DNS lookup to be cached.  Application updates, instant messenger, video games, and just about any program you can think of that connects to the internet is going to be using DNS to lookup hostnames.  When that's done, it's added to the cache the same way it would be if the site were accessed by your browser.  To see this in action, try pinging a website that you haven't recently visited, and then looking at your DNS cache.

ping   bing .com

Followed by:

You'll see bing.com (or whatever website you chose to ping) listed in the results, even though you haven't actually visited that website.

The second drawback with this approach is that you'll never know the specific pages you visited on any given website, just that you visited the website itself.

Clearing the DNS Cache

After seeing just how easy it is to inspect someone's DNS cache, you're probably wondering how to clear it.  Anytime your computer is restarted, the cache will be cleared.  Otherwise, you can run this command in the command prompt:

ipconfig /flushdns

Some routers give you the ability to log all incoming and outgoing traffic.  Every brand of router is going to be different, but this setting will most likely be disabled by default.  On Linksys routers, you can pull up the settings (192.168.1.1 in your browser), and navigate to Administration > Log.

Poke around your router settings or consult the manual to find out if yours has the option to log connections, and how to enable it.

Once enabled, you can view the log to see all established connections - you'll want to filter by outgoing.

Every single connection to your router is going to be listed in this log, so there can be a ton of information (a lot of it irrelevant), and the log can grow very huge very fast.  In this example, the router doesn't resolve the IP addresses to hostnames.  A quick search on the internet reveals that this IP address belongs to How-To Geek, so we can deduce that our computer has accessed that website.

There is a lot of misinformation circulating the internet about ways to recover your browsing history, and a lot of them sound convincing, so you may be inclined to believe them at first.  We put a few of the most common methods to the test, and here's what we found:

Using System Restore

Using three different browsers, we went to a few different websites, and then created a restore point.  From there, we cleared the history and proceeded to perform a system restore, in hopes of recovering the history that we had just deleted.

No dice.  The browsing history wasn't recovered for any of the three major browsers we tested: Internet Explorer, Firefox, and Chrome.  This is touted as the go-to method in the majority of websites and forums, but it was just a big waste of time when we tried it.

Index.dat Files

There are an abundance of guides that tell you to locate index.dat files and use third party software to open and view them.  Index.dat files do indeed contain logs of websites visited, but they aren't useful if the browsing history has been cleared.

The biggest problem is that modern browsers no longer use index.dat files; the last browser to use them was Internet Explorer 9.  So, we ran some tests with Internet Explorer 9, just to see if this method was useful for someone who's running outdated software.  Using Index.dat Suite , we were able to recover some browsing history, but after clearing it, the data inside the index.dat file disappeared.

If you need to grab the browsing history off of a computer before it gets cleared, the index.dat file makes for a good repository of sites visited, but it's useless if the history is cleared before you can get to it.  If you want to investigate index.dat files for yourself, click the link above to download the necessary software, and click the "View History" icon to have the program automatically scan for index.dat files and list the sites your computer has visited.

It's worth remembering that your entire internet browsing history is stored somewhere, whether temporarily or permanently, and whether by your ISP, the government, or whoever else decides to cache your list of browsed sites.

Typically, a warrant for the information would be required to get your ISP to release the details.  If you really want to maintain complete privacy in regards to what websites you use, check out our articles on Tor and using a VPN .

Analysing Safari browser history

09 march 2023.

• Load from a forensic image
• Copy the history files over and manually load into BHE
• Cached Files
• Session Data
• Site Settings
• Website Visits

Plist Viewer

Chromium 'Simple Cache'

Analysing browser site settings

Capturing web pages as evidence

Looks like no one’s replied in a while. To start the conversation again, simply ask a new question.

Is search history stored in icloud

Posted on Jan 23, 2017 1:00 PM

Posted on Jan 23, 2017 2:50 PM

if this is turned off and the history is cleared will all the history be removed from iCloud.

also is search history stored on mac or iPhone its self after clearing it. i want to make sure because i dot want it taking up space on my hard drive.

Loading page content

Page content loaded

Jan 23, 2017 2:50 PM in response to Eric Root

Jan 23, 2017 2:19 PM in response to Community User

Private browsing doesn't save history. Synced history isn't visible a iCloud.com. Delete the history from your devices/computer. If you don't want it there at all, turn off Safari syncing in Settings/iCloud and System Preferences/iCloud.

Personal Safety User Guide for Apple devices

• Personal safety at a glance
• What’s new in personal safety
• Use Safety Check to stop sharing
• How Safety Check works
• Additional considerations when using Safety Check
• Intro to review and take action
• Secure AirDrop and NameDrop
• Securely control whom you share content with from iPhone, iPad, and Apple Watch
• Securely control whom you share content with from Mac
• Share or stop sharing your location
• Manage automatic ETA sharing in Maps
• Manage Location Services settings
• Stop and remove location metadata in Photos
• Stay safe with AirTag
• Safely manage how you forward content
• Reject unknown sign-in attempts
• Record suspicious activity
• Store your data securely in iCloud
• Delete suspicious content
• Manage Family Sharing settings
• Avoid fraudulent requests to share info
• Securely control your Home accessories
• How to erase all content and settings
• Restore the data you backed up
• Intro to privacy and safety tools
• Update your Apple software
• Set a unique passcode or password
• Secure your iPhone or iPad with Face ID
• Secure your devices with Touch ID
• Delete unknown fingerprints from iPhone or iPad
• Add or delete fingerprints on your Mac
• Keep your Apple ID secure
• Use two-factor authentication
• Help prevent being locked out of your device
• Keep your device, app, and website passwords secure on iPhone and iPad
• Manage shared password and passkeys
• App privacy features in Apple products
• Harden your devices against mercenary spyware
• Manage safety settings in Messages
• Use Check In for Messages
• Block calls and messages
• Receive warnings about sensitive images and videos on iPhone, iPad, and Mac
• Keep your browsing history private
• Make an emergency call or text on iPhone or Apple Watch
• Obtain evidence related to another person’s account
• See who has access to your iPhone or iPad
• How to stop sharing your iPhone or iPad content
• How to stop sharing your iPhone or iPad location

Keep your browsing history private in Safari and Maps

Reviewing and clearing search history and caches for browsers and other apps may be a good practice if you’re concerned someone has access to your device. Many apps store information about what you’ve searched for and what you’ve looked at so that it’s easy for you to rediscover it in the future. For example, when you use the Maps app, having a history of locations you’ve searched for or navigated to can make it easier to navigate back to a place you recently visited.

If you’re in an unsafe personal situation and need to look up safety strategies online but don’t want Safari to keep a record of what you’ve viewed, you can open a Private Browsing window on iPhone , iPad , and Mac . When you use Private Browsing, the details of your browsing aren’t saved, and they aren’t shared across your devices. Additionally, if you’ve updated your devices to iOS 17 , iPadOS 17 , or macOS Sonoma 14 , Safari locks Private Browsing tabs after a period of inactivity so that they can be opened only with your password, passcode, Face ID or Touch ID , protecting your privacy when you’re away from your device. You can clear your browsing history and open a Private Browsing window on iPhone, iPad, and Mac.

Clear your browsing history in Safari

If you’ve been looking up information about safety strategies online and are concerned someone may see your browsing history, you can remove all records that Safari keeps about where you’ve browsed.

When you clear your history, Safari removes data it saves as a result of your browsing, including:

A history of the webpages you visited

The back and forward list for open webpages

A list of frequently visited sites

Recent searches

Icons for webpages

Snapshots saved for open webpages

A list of items you downloaded (downloaded files aren’t removed)

Websites you added for a Quick Website Search

Websites that asked to use your location

Websites that asked to send you notifications

Clear recent directions and favorites in Maps on iPhone and iPad

Do one of the following:

Swipe a recent route left.

Tap More directly above the list, then swipe a recent route left; or to delete a group of routes, tap Clear above the group.

Clear recent directions and favorites in Maps on Mac

Below Recents, click Clear Recents.

If you want to remove a Favorite location, Control-click a location (in the sidebar below Favorites), then choose Remove from Favorites.

Open a Private Browsing window on iPhone

Open the Safari app.

The tab is automatically added to a Tab Group called Private. You can open multiple private tabs in the group.

You can easily confirm that you’re in Private Browsing Mode by checking that the search field bar is gray or that it displays the word Private.

Open a Private Browsing window on iPad

While Private Browsing Mode is on, the search field background is black instead of white and sites you visit don’t appear in History on iPad or in the list of tabs on your other devices. You can open multiple private tabs in the Private Tab Group.

Open a Private Browsing window on Mac

A window using Private Browsing has a dark Smart Search field with white text.

Browse as you normally would.

If you want to always open windows with Private Browsing on Mac

Click the “Safari opens with” pop-up menu, then choose “A new private window.”

If you don’t see this option, do one of the following:

To further enhance Safari privacy

In your Downloads folder, delete any items that were downloaded while you were using Private Browsing windows.

Close any other Private Browsing windows that are still open, to prevent other people from using the Back and Forward buttons to see pages you visited.

Download this guide as a PDF