How do I clear recent searches from Safari and Google?

I'm darn concerned! Every time I start up my Apple Safari browser, I find that the program has remembered every search I've done, whether from the Google search box or when I'm actually on the Google home page. What the heck? How can I disable this "feature" and regain my privacy?

Dave's Answer:

You're not the first person to be concerned about the extraordinary memory that a Web browser has in terms of search fields, the Google toolbar box, and similar. Indeed, when I glance at the Google box in my version of Safari (that I'm using to write this very blog entry), I find:

Mac OS X Apple Safari Browser: Google search box history cache

Notice the very last entry, however: "Clear Recent Searches". That'll solve that particular problem (earlier versions of Safari might not have that feature, however, in which case it's yet another reason to consider upgrading to the very latest version of Mac OS X).

On the other hand, when I go to the Google home page, you'd think I'd be safe, right? But watch what happens if I type in an 'm' to the search box and wait just a fraction of a second:

Mac OS X Apple Safari Browser: Google search history cache

You might jump to the conclusion that Google knows all, but in fact it's not Google offering this autocompletion / history service, but your Web browser. Yes, that's another feature of Safari.

To clear this you need to tweak your Autofill preferences. Go to Safari --> Preferences and click on the Autofill tab. You'll see this:

Mac OS X Apple Safari Browser: Autofill Preferences

It's the "Other forms" that you want to check out. Click on "Edit..." next to that field and you'll find a long list of different domain names that have forms your browser is sneakily tracking:

Mac OS X Apple Safari Browser: Autofill Preferences: by Website

You can see that I've highlighted "google.com": to clear my Google search cache history from Safari, all I'd need to do is select "google.com" and press the "Remove" button. Or, if you want to clear all your cache, choose "Remove All".

Easily done.

One more step: Your browser also has a cache (history) of actual pages you visit. If you want to get rid of those too, then you can't be selective, you'll have to erase all of your browser cache. That can be pretty easily done by choosing Safari --> Clear Cache.... You'll get a warning dialog, as usual:

Mac OS X Apple Safari Browser: Empty Cache

Proceed with this action and you should be clear.

Having explained all of this,, I'd also like to draw your attention to the darn useful Private Browsing capability of Safari. Simply choose Safari --> Private Browsing. You'll get a warning dialog that pretty much tells you what will happen:

Mac OS X Apple Safari Browser: Private Browsing

Cool feature, eh? Makes worrying about histories, caches, and similar all moot.

I'd recommend you clear your old cache through the methods outlined above, then remember to switch to Private Browsing whenever you want to explore the net without leaving any sort of trail behind you.

Tip: If you're trying to duplicate this on your PC, I strongly encourage you to read the terrific writeup that my pal Leo Notenboom has on his site: How to delete history items from your Google toolbar.

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Categorized: Mac OS X Help (Article 5965, Written by Dave Taylor)
Tagged: clearing your cache, clearing your history, mac os x, safari, web browser
Previous: Assign a specific ringtone to someone on my Motorola RAZR?
Next: How do I add photos to my Apple iPod?

Reader Comments To Date: 81

Tim said, on July 31, 2006 12:05 AM:

Thanks for this information, but even after clearing my cache and switching to privacy mode, Safari still wants to autofill the url tab based on sites I have visited.

PD said, on November 13, 2006 7:39 PM:

Thank you for your very helpful advice. I have spent so much time trying to find what your have presented right here.

eddie said, on December 1, 2006 6:41 PM:

want web searches deleted, from popping up, every time a new search is entered

Stephen said, on February 24, 2007 2:40 PM:

Thank you! I really appreciate you!!!

mark said, on February 25, 2007 3:54 PM:

Great info been looking at finding how to do this fo a while on the mac and ticks the box for me. Thanks

ERIN c. said, on March 4, 2007 2:07 AM:

thaaaaaaaaaaaaaaank you!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! <3 :)

simon said, on March 5, 2007 4:42 AM:

As previous comment

Thanks for this information, but even after clearing my cache and switching to privacy mode, Safari still wants to autofill the url tab based on sites I have visited.

sagaa said, on March 31, 2007 8:42 PM:

awesome! its works thxxx

llyla said, on April 23, 2007 4:58 PM:

OMG ThaNK you SO MUCH!!!! YOU sAVED MY LifE! i was searching so stuff that i didnt want my mom sister or even friends to see. (ehem....nude people and sex and other things) but thank god for you!!!!!! i was up all night searching and searching but no luck until you cam alon! you have no idea how happy i am and i couldnt be more grateful. Thanksk again and i hops yoour life brings wealth and happiness because you SO deserve it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

roxanne said, on April 26, 2007 5:56 AM:

i want to clear all sex search history

Darrenpauli said, on July 4, 2007 1:52 AM:

Gday Dave,
I downloaded the Safari beta when it was first released and think its great, however I cannot clear the autofill form. The edit button is greyed-out and unclickable, and the previous form entries keep appearing even after I empty the cache and reset all features of Safari. I'm going to re-download and reinstall, but for reference, do you know where Safari stores the autofill info? I'm on XP.
Cheers,
Dash

James said, on July 23, 2007 4:16 AM:

Hi Dave, i tried to use your suggestion to clear all the words which i have put into the google site which are unwanted but keep poppoing up...it doesnt seem to work, in the auto fill "other forms" section it only lists site which i have typed in and been too, it does not show nor give me the option to delete words which i have searched...any advice ?

mr.steevo said, on July 23, 2007 11:31 PM:

hi,

If you have a url in your bookmarks it will come up when you type in the address bar something starting with the same letters.

s.

jason Nolan said, on August 25, 2007 4:21 PM:

THANK YOU. I use my computer for teaching, and what may be totally appropriate everywhere else may still not be suitable for the classroom overhead.

Kenny said, on October 8, 2007 7:15 PM:

Your site is so helpful!!! thank you so much!

Tom said, on October 28, 2007 4:26 AM:

Thanks, Dave. You made it easy to do something that other web sites made so complicated it was impossible.

meagan byer said, on December 2, 2007 2:28 AM:

Thanks for this helpful tip! I was going crazy on google trying to figure it out by pressing
"delete"

lucy said, on January 14, 2008 2:19 PM:

This is a great tutorial! Only problem for me is after this step:

"To clear this you need to tweak your Autofill preferences. Go to Safari --> Preferences and click on the Autofill tab."

My stupid computer won't even let me see ANY Safari preferences, let alone the ones for autofill. I've tried re-downloading Safari and everything, and one website I went to said to delete the com.apple.Safari.plist file that's in my library. Do you have any suggestions? :(

kjkjd said, on January 18, 2008 3:34 PM:

god bless you

richard said, on February 12, 2008 1:22 PM:

This is great but is it possible to delete some items from the Google search box and not others?

jamie said, on February 22, 2008 12:50 PM:

thank you very much. you are so great!!!

Mary said, on February 26, 2008 12:30 PM:

wow thanks for the graphic info

Bob said, on March 6, 2008 3:25 PM:

Thank You so much!!!!!!!!!!!! Now I don't have to worry about anything

colin Copp said, on March 25, 2008 9:20 PM:

thanks alot i had no idea it was that complicated

Ale said, on April 1, 2008 8:54 PM:

thaaaaaank you! ;)

Danica said, on April 17, 2008 8:18 AM:

THANK YOU SO MUCH! i always wondered how i could disable the autofill.

John Reves said, on May 24, 2008 3:20 PM:

Thanks for trying, but your advice does not work. It is not possible to turn off the Safari URL autofill function or to delete the URL already stored "somewhere" which pop into the URL window uninvited. Neither the "geniuses" at the apple stores or their on-line consultants are able to fix this annoying problem. After spending several hours on the phone with one of apple's consultants some time ago, he gave up and told me "Safari is really poor browser anyway; just use Firefox if you want to avoid this problem."

If you ever find a fix for this annoying behavior I would love to hear about it but clearing the cache, history, all the rest you have mentioned DO NOT WORK.

Pat Tierney said, on May 29, 2008 8:19 AM:

Dear Dave - how do you make it all so simple? You are surely the eighth wonder of the world! Thank you -

Pat

Yanira Torres said, on May 29, 2008 4:24 PM:

This is great! You are the best! :)

David Lucier said, on June 8, 2008 11:50 PM:

Dear Dave,

Thanks for the clear description on removing autofill from the google search box. No wonder your so successful in life.

David
Santa Cruz, CA

Wayne said, on June 21, 2008 8:07 PM:

Hello Dave ... as JOHN REEVES above (24 May 2008 at 3:20 PM) points out, your suggestion (which I'd actually found out myself and tried before seeing your recommendation) seems to only PARTIALLY work, at best.

EVEN AFTER doing the "Safari-Preferences-Autofill-Other Forms-Remove" etc. etc. ... you will still find that Safari Autofills URLs if you begin manually typing them in after the http:// ...

It's almost as if Safari does not "want" to clear sites that you have manually typed in. That's just a guess ... I don't know for sure ... I DO KNOW that the suggestion provided does not FULLY work.

Just thought I'd put this out there in case someone knows why ... or has a workaround solution.

boatin'fool said, on July 1, 2008 10:20 AM:

I also had the problem, that after trying your methods, the various pages continued to pop up in the safari browser. So, I went one more step that Dave hadn't mentioned:
Click on Safari > Reset Safari >
and you'll get a list of 9 choices you can select to "edit", like "clear history", "empty the cache", "remove all cookies", etc.
I selected lines 1,2,4,7 &8, and so I don't know which one really did it, but I got rid of all the unmentionables (just in time before my Kids came home for the 4th).
Oddly enough, Safari still retains NPR.org, all the www.Mac & www.apple addresses, and other innocent sites!
Thanks, Dave, and everybody!
K
PS, I don't know why anyone would've advised that Safari "is a poor browser", this whole Mac think is so much better than the PC world!

Jon said, on July 7, 2008 5:45 PM:

holy cow, that's awesome! i used to be a pc guy but i see why lots of people like mac

Me said, on July 27, 2008 10:22 AM:

Thank you!!! I spent a lot of time trying to figure this out... This was just what i was looking for and you couldn't have made it any simpler!!! Perfect! Thanks again!

Lee said, on September 9, 2008 8:45 AM:

WOW this is so helpful !! i dont like prying into every option on my Mac, this was the best article on how to clear the history without me fumbling around with Mac options!!

Thanks!!

libbi roberts said, on September 9, 2008 9:14 AM:

Thank you - I've been trying to do this for ages : )

shirley charity said, on September 19, 2008 12:13 PM:

my name is spelled wromg in my autofill it is shirley and my e mail is sc.charity@yahoo.com please change thank you

sean said, on September 20, 2008 2:11 AM:

THAAANNNKK YOU!!!!!!!! i 've been trying this for a month

Jay said, on September 24, 2008 10:42 PM:

You are a champion!! Thanks mate

Storme Watson said, on October 11, 2008 7:15 AM:

Hi, many thanks for your info but unfortunately its not working for me.
i do understand it and have followed carefully,
ive done clear cache, history etc
ive even reset safari but still i get loads of searches when entering anything into google.
and ive repaired permissions too
any ideas?
osx 10.4.11
safari 3.1.2
many thanks for your time
Storme Watson UK

storme Watson said, on October 11, 2008 7:39 AM:

me again & oops!
there were two google entries in that list, got 2nd one this time and it worked!
THANKYOU!

Storme Watson uk

Storme Watson said, on October 11, 2008 7:48 AM:

oh dear me once more, yes ive got rid of the google autofilling
but the url list is still there even after cache clear, reset, etc
so.. back to any ideas?!!

many thanks
Storme Watson

Jake said, on November 14, 2008 4:29 PM:

Thank YOu sooo much!!

Jessica said, on November 21, 2008 7:59 PM:

Oh, thanks for all the help.
I've read other people's comments too, and I'm understanding that the history from the url toolbar is still showing up.

I have a solution for that:

On the toolbar (the bookmarks toolbar, under the url toolbar) there's an icon next to "Apple" [on the left side] where a picture of a 'book' is shown (it is most likely the 1st icon from the left). Click on that, and then under 'Bookmarks' (on the left hand side), it says "Imported IE Favorites". Click it.

Then on the right side, all the lists of website that you've visited will show up. Click on the website you want to delete, and then press the DELETE button on your keyboard!

Khizar said, on December 25, 2008 1:34 PM:

How can i improve my browsers speed

Lawrence Stone said, on January 5, 2009 1:18 PM:

Same as everyone else! Amazing thankyou!!

ayush agrwal said, on January 26, 2009 4:07 AM:

thank you for your help

Rob Byrne said, on January 30, 2009 2:36 PM:

I have the latest OS X and I'm able to make the searches disappear when i reset safari but they are "reconnected", usually within a day.

In addition to the paid-for stuff, my actual searches reappear, sometimes in a couple of hours, sometimes in a couple of days.

Anything else?

Thanks

Rob

Paula said, on February 23, 2009 8:29 AM:

I a new to much. This helped me a lot.
Thanks

theania said, on March 15, 2009 8:40 PM:

Hi - In the new version of safari (version 4, beta), how do you clear recent searches in the google search toolbar box? I tried emptying the cache and removing google.com from the autofill menu. there is no option in the toolbar box to "clear recent searches" like there is in firefox. do i just have to live with this?
thanks dave

Denis Gray said, on April 2, 2009 12:35 AM:

I have clicked on Private Browsing on My Safari but it is not permanent. It seems to cancel itself.

Tiala said, on June 5, 2009 6:39 PM:

Hi Dave

I am using a shared Safari OS X 10.5.7

I have noticed that a particular site has regularly appeared in my cookies folder but not on the google browsing bar so I take it that the search has been done in Private Browsing as it still loads cookies unless the cookies have been disabled.

The person denying having been into this site has told me that these cookies can appear without being in the site at all, ie.
If the site in question is linked or appears in the body of another site that has been accessed. I have tried to make this happen myself but have not been able to see where it is coming from if this is the case. Can this actually happen and is there any way to find out when Private Browsing mode has been used?

Thankyou in advance.
Tiala

Dave Taylor said, on June 10, 2009 8:12 AM:

Tiala, the other person is right. What a lot of sites do is have what are called iframes, essentially tiny windows that let them load content from unrelated sites as part of their design. You can, at the most simple, have a graphic come from another site (imagine that the coffee cup on this page were actually from a Starbucks.com server, for example) which would then show up as part of the traffic stream, but the more complex inclusions that have JavaScript or even programmatic objects included (like Google AdSense) can leave a trail behind even though you never explicitly go there. A common culprit for this is Doubleclick.net, an ad network.

Nietzsche said, on June 11, 2009 10:20 AM:

You can also consider using third party tools to make sure the info is cleaned from your browsers, something like History Killer Pro (http://www.historykillerpro.com)

michael said, on June 16, 2009 11:01 AM:

hi there....have followed all your instructions to clear google search box history but when i click on 'other forms ' in autofill tab there is no list of any web sites visited !

any other ways of deleting google search box history ?
i use a Mac and my browser is Safari.

any suggestions most welcome

thanx

Jack Angel said, on July 14, 2009 1:47 PM:

Dave,

This is great for Safari but what about Mac and Firefox?

Jack

ters said, on September 16, 2009 9:41 PM:

I use Safari on a Mac and just recently the google search bar stopped showing the "clear recent searches" option at the bottom.
Where is it? What happened? and how do I compensate?
As I am trying to delete search items pertaining to a surprise party it would be too suspicious if I suddenly switched browser.

please help before the surprise is ruined.

Jack said, on September 19, 2009 9:16 PM:

Clearing recent searches doesn't work for me. I see no list at the bottom showing clear recent searches. I have a new Mac OS10.5.8

Dave Taylor said, on September 19, 2009 9:23 PM:

Jack, you're right, Apple's made this a bit harder by removing the "clear recent searches" from the search box in Safari. Instead, go to the "Safari" Menu and choose "Reset Safari...". From the many check boxes, select "Clear History" and that should do the trick!

Moth said, on September 28, 2009 7:28 PM:

Selecting Clear History in Reset Safari removed all my History, not just Google search history. That is not what I wanted at all.

Mike said, on October 3, 2009 7:25 AM:

Why would Apple remove the Clear Recent Searches option from the search field menu? APPLE, if you're reading this... PUT IT BACK!

Eric said, on October 12, 2009 10:16 AM:

The "Clear recent searches"-box is removed?

Pamela said, on October 21, 2009 3:02 AM:

I used regularly to clear Recent Searches on Safari Leopard by using the method above and clicking on "Clear Recent Searches" but that option is not now available now I have installed Snow Leopard. Have I got to clear the cache to clear Recent Searches?

Amy said, on January 4, 2010 4:55 PM:

How long does information stay in the 'Recent Searches' pulldown? Does Safari randomly put your recent searches or are they in order by last visited?

daniele said, on June 25, 2010 3:28 AM:

I made a script to delete all links containing specified words in safari4mac history,
could be scheduled in crontab or any other way, to run every 10-30 mins.
Allow you to delete for example all youtube or any other links from history in mac safari leaving others.

If you are interested contact me at customkshscripts@gmail.com

Jon Cook said, on July 24, 2010 1:17 AM:

Hey Dave I was wondering if you know how to only delete part of your safari search on an iPhone. I want to keep some stuff but not all. Any advice?

Nari said, on July 24, 2010 5:13 PM:

Thanks for posting this!

Unfortunately, after trying all that you suggested, still the history was showing in the toolbar when I typed a new search. Only after I selected 'Reset Safari' in the Safari drop down menu and checked the correct options on the page that opened up did the toolbar history empty out.

Options I checked were:

Clear History
Empty the Cache
Remove all cookies
Remove other autoFill form text.

Hope that helps those who are still having problems!

amy said, on August 12, 2010 3:34 AM:

thanks Nari, that finally worked!

Arnie said, on October 17, 2010 2:55 PM:

I've tried all the above, including totally Resetting Safari. And, still, when I search for something, if one of the pages Google lists is one I've visited in the past, next to the site name (line 1 of entry), it lists the date(s) and # of times I've been there. Can that be cleared away, too? Thank you

Jimmy said, on December 15, 2010 12:35 PM:

Excellent tip

Danuta Rzepecka said, on January 9, 2011 1:45 PM:

I will like to get back to original setup for my computer Apple Mac

Sarah said, on February 18, 2011 12:29 AM:

Hi,
I maneged to do it to my computer, but is there a way you can clear all searches on my browser if my iPod touch ?

Thanks,
Sarah

Demuni U. De Silva said, on March 19, 2011 1:02 PM:

Happy to continue work on this with you.
Thanks a lot.

Ronilyn Mussared said, on April 2, 2011 7:35 AM:

Thank you! I have a sneaky husband, but unfortunately, I have nothing to hide. Quite irritating, actually, and I mean the sneaky husband, not the nothing to hide part.

Justanother1 said, on May 13, 2011 12:08 PM:

The fix is simple. Delete Google from phone. Reinstall Google from the app store. All the drop down boxes will be gone.
It doesn't take long to do this either.
Hope this helps.

Nanda Kumar said, on January 5, 2012 12:29 AM:

sir,please delete our old google address bar search list.

K.Nanda Kumar said, on January 5, 2012 12:31 AM:

sir, please clear our recent search list.

Michael said, on February 27, 2012 12:45 PM:

What About if I am doing this for Google Chrome? Will it work the same Way?

Poster said, on April 20, 2012 6:28 PM:

In Safari 5.1.5 this link is gone already, where to clear the search history in the browser top right corner now??

tenman said, on December 13, 2012 1:40 AM:

thanz alot. good clear concise information is really hard to come by on the web, and i love the fact that you add the screen shotz az well.

Teila said, on December 16, 2012 1:48 PM:

Safari is one of the worse browsers when it comes to privacy. The bottom line is that no matter what you do, or what you select in the preferences, Safari does a horrible job at being an advocate for the computer user as its preferences are pretty much worthless. Apple needs to pay more attention to revamping the security features of Safari.

No matter what you select, cookies will continue to collect, and the whole "ask do not track" option is nothing but you asking a site not to track you... whether they comply or not is their business, but it should be your browsers business. When you select no cookies, etc... Safari should be robust enough to stop every cookie, etc., in its tracks.

There should be a "make me untraceable" option... not a silly "ask web sites not to track me" option (which is utterly ridiculous; that's like asking a con man not to con you).

I do have a lot to say, and questions of my own for that matter, but first I'd like to say thank you, Dave, for all your helpful information by buying you a cup of coffee!

I do have a comment, now that you mention it!

How do I clear recent searches from Safari and Google?

Reader Comments To Date: 81

I do have a comment, now that you mention it!

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