Key Takeaways
- Clearing your Safari history removes cookies and reduces online tracking.
- The process for deleting web history is different for Mac, iPhone, and iPad.
- You can use Private Browsing Mode to prevent web history from being saved.
From accessing your bank account on a shared computer to Googling embarrassing queries, there are a number of reasons to want to clear out your search history. Deleting your history on Safari removes your trail of web browsing, but the process also does more than clear out potentially embarrassing websites.
Clearing your history will also remove associated cookies from the web browser, reducing the number of ways you are being tracked online. While clearing your web history only removes cookies from Safari and not third-party websites that already have your data, it can still be helpful to reduce online tracking. Clearing the related cache can also sometimes fix bugs.
Deleting a web history from Safari isn’t a terribly complicated process, but the steps are a bit different if you are using a MacBook, iPad, or iPhone. The steps for clearing several web pages and a single website are also different. Some privacy settings can also prevent you from deleting any web history, leaving the buttons you need grayed out.
There are also a few tricks that can make the process simpler. For example, if you turn on iCloud for Safari, when you delete the history from your Mac, it will automatically be deleted from your phone and tablet too. If you know you want to delete your web history before you make a single click, you can use Private Browsing Mode instead.
Whether you are a murder mystery writer looking to eliminate search queries that would raise the eyebrows of any detective, or you want to reduce the number of cookies tracking you, this guide will tell you how to delete Safari history in a few simple steps.
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How to delete Safari history on a Mac
Click on History in the toolbar
A screenshot of the process to delete Safari history
Safari allows you to delete a lot of web history from a Mac or MacBook at once by allowing you to choose the dates for which you would like to erase. If you want to clear websites from the last hour, last day, last two days or all of your web history, this is the process to use.
- Open Safari
- From the top toolbar, click on History, then click Clear History.
- In the pop-up window, use the drop-down menu to select the time period you want to clear from your history.
- Click Clear History.
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How to delete Safari history on an iPhone or iPad
Open Settings app and go to Safari
The steps for clearing out your Safari history on an iPhone is quite different from using a Safari browser on a Mac. But, the process is the same across both iPhones and iPads, so these steps below work for both your phone and tablet.
- Open the Settings app.
- Select Safari.
- Scroll down to the Privacy & Security section and select Clear History and Website Data.
- On the next page, tap the time frame that you would like to delete the history for.
- Optional: If you also want to close out of all open websites, tap the toggle for Close All Tabs.
- Tap Clear History.
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How to delete a single website from Safari history
Safari allows you to easily delete websites from the last hour, day, two days, or your entire web history easily. But, if you only want to remove a single website, you’ll instead have to access your history, and then select the individual page to remove.
A screenshot of the process to delete Safari history
On a Mac:
- Open a Safari browser.
- From the top toolbar, select History > Show All History. Or, you can use the keyboard shortcut Command + Y.
- Select the website entry that you wish to delete. If that site was not visited today, you will need to tap on the date that you visited the website to find it or use the search bar at the top.
- Right-click on the website entry and select delete.
On an iPhone or iPad:
- Open Safari
- Tap the Bookmark icon on the bottom (it looks like an open book).
- Tap the Clock or History icon at the top of the page.
- Locate the website that you wish to delete from your history — your history is organized by the date you visited.
- On the website you wish to delete, swipe left, then tap on the red trash icon.
How to use Private mode in Safari
If you know that you’ll want to delete the website that you are about to visit from your history, try using Private Browsing Mode instead. This mode does not save any website history, including search history and autofill information. That means you can do your online banking without going back and deleting your web history when you are done.
A screenshot of the process to delete Safari history
To use Private Browsing Mode on a Mac:
- Open Safari.
- On the top toolbar, go to File > New Private Window.
- Use this new private window for browsing. You can quickly see if a Safari browser is Private because the field to type in the URL is dark gray instead of white.
To use Private Browsing Mode on iOS:
- Open Safari.
- Tap the tab icon in the bottom left corner.
- At the bottom of the screen, tap Private (swipe to see all the toppings in this toolbar if you do not see the Private option.)
- Tap Done.
- Private browsing will have a dark gray URL field instead of white. To return to regular browsing, repeat the steps but this time swipe back to your open tabs.
FAQ
Q: How to instantly clear your web history from multiple devices
With iCloud, Safari can save your web browsing across all the devices that you use with your Apple ID. While that’s helpful for quickly recalling a website no matter what device you first opened it with, it also syncs any deletions to the web history across your devices. That means if you delete a web page from your history on a Mac, it will automatically be deleted from your iPhone too — as long as both devices are logged into the same Apple ID and iCloud for Safari is enabled.
iCloud for Safari can be enabled during the setup process for a new device, but it can also be turned on and off from the Settings app:
- Open the Settings app.
- Tap on your Apple ID or name at the top.
- Tap on iCloud.
- Under Apps Using iCloud, select Show All. (If you are running iOS 15 or earlier, you may not see the full list already instead of the Show All option, in which case you can jump to the next step.)
- Toggle on Safari from the list.
Q: Why can’t I clear my Safari history?
In some cases, the buttons that you need to tap to clear your Safari history are gray. But why can’t you delete your Safari history, and how do you fix it? Here are a few common reasons why the Safari history options are grayed out:
- You’ve already deleted your history and there are no more websites to clear out.
- Web content restrictions are turned on. Some parental control settings prevent kids and teens from deleting their web history, while other content restrictions can also prevent you from deleting. To access the content restriction options, open the Settings app and go to Screen Time > Content & Privacy Restrictions.
- You are using Private Browsing Mode. This mode does not save your web history, so you have nothing to delete.
Q: Can you permanently delete Safari history?
Deleting your Safari history makes it difficult for the average person to recover the past websites that you have visited. However, if you are connected to your work or school network, in some cases the network administrator can still see your website access. Deleting your website history also may not fool a trained digital forensics expert during an investigation.
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