recover deleted history safari mac

Data Recovery

3 Simple Ways to Recover Deleted Safari History on Mac

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When most Mac users delete their Safari browser history, the last thing they want is for it to ever come back. But from time to time, users clear their browsing history on accident or realize that it contained an important website whose address they don’t remember anymore.

If you’re currently in the same situation, then this article will help you solve it because it describes the top 3 ways to recover deleted Safari history on Mac. But before we get to them, we need to briefly explain what Safari browser history actually is and where you can find it.

Table of Contents

What Is Safari History and How to Find It?

Safari history is a database containing previously visited websites. Just like most other web browsers, Safari keeps it automatically to make it easier for users to revisit familiar websites without having to enter their addresses over and over again.

To view Safari history:

Open Safari on your Mac.
Choose the History option.
Click Show All History

You should see a table with two columns and multiple rows. The first column from the left shows the names of previously visited websites, while the second column shows their addresses. Individual entries are grouped by date, so you can easily go back in time and view history on Safari Mac from a specific date. Alternatively, you can use the search bar in the top-right corner to find all history entries that contain specified keywords.

All the information that you can see when you click the Show All History button is stored on your hard drive, inside a file called History.db. This file is located in the ~/Library/Safari/ folder.

To find and open the History.db file:

Open Finder.
Choose the Go option.
Click Go to Folder.
Enter the path to the Safari history file location in the textbox and click OK.
Open History.db with TextEdit.

You will see a long text file that’s anything but easy to decipher. That’s because History.db is actually an SQLite database file, and it’s not intended to be viewed in a regular text editor. Instead, you should open it using a database browser like DB Browser for SQLite , which you can download for free right from its official website.

After installing DB Browser for SQLite, launch the app and click Open Database. Select the History.db file and switch to the Browse Data tab. Finally, select the history_items table.

How Can Safari History Be Deleted and When It Can Be Recovered?

Let’s take a look at some common reasons for deleting Safari history and whether it can be recovered:

🎯 Intentional deletion: Many Safari users like to keep their browsing history squeaky clean to prevent others from examining their online activity. That’s all fine and good until you need the address of a website you’ve visited a long time ago and can’t remember it.
🩹 Accidental deletion: All you need to do to delete your Safari history is click the Clear History button and confirm your decision. By default, Safari deletes only the last hour of browsing history, but you can also tell it delete all history in one go. What often happens is that users want to delete only the last hour but don’t notice that the option to delete all history is selected, causing their entire browsing history to disappear immediately.
🔐 Private Browsing: Safari allows you to open a Private Window (Command+Shift+N) that prevents your browsing history from being recorded. Safari users sometimes don’t realize that they’re browsing the web in the Private Window and wonder why their browsing history hasn’t been recorded.
🗃️ Formatting: When reinstalling macOS, it’s sometimes a good idea to first format the system drive to start with a clean slate. It goes without saying that formatting doesn’t erase just Safari history but also all other files stored on the hard drive.
👾 Hackers: Mac users are relatively safe from malware since most cybercriminals target Windows computers, but that doesn’t mean they are completely immune. From ransomware to remote desktop hacks, there are multiple cyber-threats that can cause Mac users to lose their entire Safari browsing history in the blink of an eye.

How to Perform Safari History Recovery?

There are three main methods for recovering Safari history on Mac, and we describe all of them in the same order we recommend you try them.

Method 1: Use Disk Drill

To restore deleted history of Safari browsing with Disk Drill:

Launch Disk Drill and select your main hard drive.

Type “history.db” into the search field in the top-right corner and hit Return.

Choose a safe recovery destination and click OK.

You can then view deleted Safari history in your favorite text editor or database browser. To view it in Safari, you need to copy the recovered History.db file to ~/Library/Safari and overwrite the file that’s currently in the location.

Method 2: Restore from iCloud backup

Here’s what you need to do:

Tap on your name.
Select iCloud.
Locate Safari and toggle the switch next to it until you’re prompted to merge your data.

This way, you force your iPhone to overwrite Safari browsing history in iCloud, which, in turn, allows you to recover deleted Safari history on Mac just by turning on the Safari option in iCloud settings (see the last section of this article for a step-by-step guide).

Method 3: Restore from Time Machine backup

To restore deleted history of Safari browsing using Time Machine:

Close Safari
Open Finder and select Go -> Go to Folder.

Scroll down until you find the History.db file and select it.

Go back in time until you see a version of the History.db file that contains your lost Safari browsing history.

The next time you open Safari, your browsing history should be back. That’s how easy it is to retrieve deleted history of Safari browsing using Time Machine.

The only problem with this method is that it will work only if Time Machine was enabled prior to the data loss incident. If it wasn’t, then you won’t have any backup of the History.db file to recover.

How to Prevent Safari History Loss?

The best way to prevent Safari history loss is to turn on Safari in iCloud preferences. That way, iCloud will automatically back up your Safari data to the cloud, allowing you to keep it synchronized across your devices and easily retrieve it should anything happen to your Mac.

To back up your Safari browsing history with iCloud:

Open the System Preferences app on your Mac.

Your Safari browsing history will be automatically synchronized across all Apple devices that use the same Apple ID.

How can I recover deleted Safari tabs on iPhone?

Use this simple procedure to recover closed or deleted Safari tabs on an iPhone.

Open Safari and tap the Tabs button in the bottom-right corner. (It’s two overlapping squares)
Tap and hold the Plus (+) button at the bottom of the screen.
A list of the recently closed tabs is displayed. Tap an item to open it in a new tab.
Save the tab as a bookmark to ensure it never gets lost.

How do I recover deleted Safari history on iPad?

You can use the following procedure if you have backed up your iPad to iCloud.

Select Settings > General > Reset on your iPad.
Choose Erase All Content and Settings .
Follow the setup prompts and select the Restore from iCloud Backup option in the Apps & Data screen.
Sign in to iCloud and select a backup that has your deleted Safari history and use it to restore your device.

How to recover deleted Google Chrome history on iPhone?

You can use data recovery software like Disk Drill to recover your deleted Google Chrome history with the following procedure.

Install Disk Drill on your Mac.
Connect the iPhone to your computer.
Launch Disk Drill and select the iPhone from the disk list.
Click the Search for lost data button to scan the device.
Preview the found files and look for a Google Chrome History and Preferences file.
Select the file to be restored and click the Recover button.

Tips & Tricks

Troubleshooting, how to recover deleted safari history on mac.

How to restore and recover deleted Safari history on Mac

Have you ever wanted to recover deleted Safari history on a Mac? Maybe you unintentionally cleared all history and web data or deleted specific Safari history and you’d like to reverse those decisions and get the browsing history back? Or maybe you’re doing a little bit of investigative work for some reason or another, or you’d like to explore some simple digital forensics for Safari browser history on a Mac?

We’ll show you a simple way of recovering deleted Safari history on a Mac.

Since we’re aiming for a simple approach here, we’ll be relying on Time Machine, the backup service on Macs, which happens to offer the simplest way to recover deleted Safari history on a Mac – or recover any deleted file for that matter – though our focus here is on the Safari web browser. Thus, this approach obviously requires an accompanying Time Machine backup used by the particular Mac in question. If the Mac does not have a Time Machine backup setup and regular backups that are maintained, this simple history recovery approach will not work. Because this restores via a backup, any interim data between when that backup was made and when the restore happened will be lost, so keep that in mind before beginning this process, particular if the current browser history is also important – it’d be wise to back it up first too.

How to Recover Deleted Safari History on a Mac, the Easy Way

Assuming you have the Time Machine backup, here is how you can recover deleted Safari history on a Mac:

Quit out of Safari in Mac OS if you have not done so already
Connect the Time Machine backup drive to the Mac if it is not already connected
From the Finder, pull down the “Go” menu and choose “Go To Folder” and enter the following path:

Go to Folder to the Safari data location on Mac

Once you’re in the ~/Library/Safari directory, select the “History.db” file and then pull down the Time Machine menu in the upper-right corner and choose “Enter Time Machine”

Navigate and scroll through Time Machine history of the ~/Library/Safari/ directory, when you reach the desired date that contains the Safari history data you’d like to recover, click on the “Restore” button in Time Machine

Restore and recover deleted Safari History

When Time Machine finishes restoring the ~/Library/Safari/ directory, you’re now free to access the freshly recovered version of the deleted Safari history
Relaunch Safari on the Mac with the freshly restored History now intact
In Safari, pull down the “History” menu and choose “Show All History”

How to show all browsing history in Safari on Mac

You can now browse, search, and find specific Safari history from the restored Safari History.db file just like you would as usual

Browsing through Safari web history on Mac

That’s it, now you have restored the browser history from Safari that was deleted!

Inside the ~/Library/Safari/ folder on the Mac, you’re specifically looking for the “History.db” file, which can be a good size depending on how much web browsing you do. It’s essentially just a database file that you can query directly with SQL if you’d like to, but that’s not what we’re going to do here since you can also just access, search, and browse through Safari history in Safari on the Mac itself , and we’re aiming to keep things simple for this particular tutorial.

Note this approach will only work for recovering and restoring Safari browsing history that was deleted or cleared from the Mac, it will *not* work for recovering a private session where no history was created. For example, if you use Private Browsing in Safari for Mac to prevent history from being gathered in the first place, there would be no history data to restore from Time Machine (or in general outside of some complicated memory or swap extraction attempt anyway, which is exceedingly more advanced than this tutorial would even attempt to imply, though it could be theoretically possible in some scenarios).

Obviously this approach is for the Mac, but theoretically you could use a similar method for iOS too. Users can always search Safari History on the iPhone or iPad too , as well as delete specific browser history on the iOS Safari browser, but to recover deleted Safari history in iOS you would need to be able to restore a device with a backup either from iCloud or iTunes that contained the deleted Safari history. That’s a topic for another article however, so that won’t be discussed here.

Was this helpful to you if you needed or wanted to restore deleted Safari web browser history on a Mac? Do you know of another approach that works? Share your comments and experiences in the comments below!

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10 Comments

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I have tried these steps. I still am not able to recover my browsing history. Any advise?

Just tried this on Mac OS Catalina. As soon as I launched Safari afterwards it replaced the recovered History.db (9MB) with the original one (98KB). Any thoughts?

I had the same problem on macOS Big Sur. It turns out that background processes of Safari are still running even after quitting the Safari app itself. They are the ones causing the restored History.db to be completely ignored and overwritten. Here is the solution I found: 1) Open Utilities > Activity Monitor 2) Quit not just Safari, but any processes containing “Safari” in their name, such as “com.apple.Safari…” 3) Restore History.db 4) Launch Safari again

I’ve tried to recover my Safari history going back about a year. All I can get via Time Machine is about 3 weeks (18.4 MB of data). This was using your procedure above. Should I be recovering (at the same time) the other history files (history.db-lock, history.db-shm, history.db-wal)? Can I restore all 4 files at the same time via Time Machine?

What I’m afraid of is replacing the current history with the restored one without merging them together…

Geez, I go out of my way to completely and utterly erase all web-browser data after each and every session… Does anyone really trust the internet now-a-days ?

Wouldn’t this eliminate new history since the date of the backup?

Yes, unless you copy that too. This is mentioned in the third paragraph of the article, regarding new browser history since date of backup:

“Because this restores via a backup, any interim data between when that backup was made and when the restore happened will be lost, so keep that in mind before beginning this process, particular if the current browser history is also important – it’d be wise to back it up first too.”

FWIW that is also how system restores work when downgrading or restoring other aspects; the restore is from the time of that backup, so interim data is lost unless it’s copied separately.

Frankly I am a little surprised that Time Machine doesn’t offer a “diff” service to address that, but that could be seen as overly complex for how Time Machine aims to be simple. Or “merge” too, like what is frequently seen in version control systems.

Also a little surprised that Time Machine doesn’t offer cloud backups yet…

Unfortunately, I have not been using Time Machine. So I wonder if I can recover deleted safari history.

Great article, this has a lot of potential uses! I have accidentally trashed Safari history before myself and used nearly the same methodology to recover it, though I had to figure it out on my own rather than use a nice guide like this.

One thing to note, there is a difference with new Safari vs old Safari, though I do not know the version cutoff.

The new modern versions of Safari have Safari history located at:

~/Library/Safari/History.db

The History.db file is a database file, you can use SQLite to access it directly with all URLs, date, time, etc.

Meanwhile, the older versions of Safari have history located at:

~/Library/Safari/History.plist

In those older versions of Safari, History.plist is a simple plist file that can be read or accessed through a quality text editor (BBedit etc) or plist editor.

Same overall directory, just a different file (plist vs db).

However, the restore approach from Time Machine would be identical, except in this case for older Safari versions on Mac you are looking for

rather than

All else is the same though.

I have went through this before when accidentally deleting the History.plist file and I recovered it manually through Time Machine in the way described, it works exactly the same.

Just in case this is helpful to anyone ;)

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Home > Mac Data Recovery Tips

3 Ways to Recover Deleted Safari History on MacBook (2024)

Updated on Monday, April 29, 2024

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How to Recover Deleted Safari Browsing History on Mac?

Summary: This post mainly talks about how to recover deleted Safari history on Mac in 3 simple ways, including using the iBoysoft data recovery app, TimeMachine, and iCloud. Besides, it covers how to find and open Safari History.db files on MacBook.

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iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac

Sometimes, to keep your Safari browsing history clean and to prevent others from examining your online activity, you may choose to delete Safari browser history. That's all fine until you need the address of a website you've visited before and can't remember it.

If you're looking for ways to recover the deleted Safari history on Mac , then this post will help you because it addresses the top 3 methods to retrieve deleted Safari history on Mac. In addition, it briefly explains what Safari browser history is and where you can find it.

How to recover deleted Safari history on Mac:

What is Safari history?

Safari history is a database file that contains your previously visited websites. Just like most other web browsers, Safari keeps the history file automatically. So it is easier for users to revisit some websites to recover deleted apps on Mac without having to find and enter their addresses once again.

How to find and open Safari history on Mac?

Normally, there are two ways to view Safari history on Mac or MacBook. One is to check it in Safari. Another is to find the Safari History.db file in Finder.

Find history in Safari:

Open Safari on your Mac.
On the menu bar, select the History option.

Then, you'll see a table with two columns and multiple rows. The first column from the left shows the names of the websites you previously visited and these sites are sorted by date, while the second column shows their full addresses.

View the History.db file in Finder:

All the information that you can see when you click the Show All History button in Safari is stored on the Macintosh hard drive, which is named History.db. To find and open it, do the following:

Open Finder.
Choose the Go option, click Go to Folder .

Locate the History.db file, then you will find you can't open it with any built-in macOS app. It's a database file, you need to use a database browser like DB Browser for SQLite to open it.

Here's how to open Safari History.db file:

After installing DB Browser for SQLite for free, launch the app. Then click Open Database and select the History.db file. Finally, switch to the Browse Data tab, select the history_items. You can see all the previously visited websites.

With these two options, you can easily find your Safari history on MacBook. But what if you lost all the Safari history due to accidental deletion or intentional deletion to protect your privacy, is it possible to find them back?

How to recover deleted Safari history on Mac?

Fortunately, there are three main ways to recover deleted Safari history on Mac:

iBoysoft data recovery
TimeMachine

Method 1: Recover deleted Safari history with data recovery software

Using a data recovery tool is the simplest and quickest way to recover deleted files on Mac , including the deleted Safari history. iBoysoft Mac Data Recovery is a top-ranking, professional, and safe data recovery tool.

It helps recover deleted documents, emails, photos, videos, and other types of files from your Mac hard drive. Besides, it also allows recovering files from external hard drives on Mac . Thus, iBoysoft data recovery for Mac is perfect for recovering the History.db file that has been accidentally or intentionally deleted.

Just follow the steps below to recover deleted Safari history on Mac:

Download and install iBoysoft Data Recovery for Mac on your Mac or MacBook.

From the scanning results, find the deleted History.db file by typing “History.db” into the search field in the top-right corner and then hit the Return key.
Select the deleted History.db file and click Recover to save it to another destination.

You can then view deleted Safari history in DB Browser for SQLite. To view it in Safari, you need to copy the recovered History.db file to ~/Library/Safari folder and overwrite the file that's currently in the location.

Method 2: Recover deleted history on Mac Safari with TimeMachine backup

Time Machine is a built-in feature in macOS that enables you to back up important files on your Mac. If you have backed up your Mac with Time Machine before deleting the Safari history, you can use the Time Machine backups to retrieve the deleted Safari browsing data. Here's what to do:

Open Finder and select Go > Go to Folder .
Enter ~/Library/Safari and click the Go button.
Scroll down until you find the History.db database file and select it.
Click on the Time Machine from the menu bar, and select Enter Time Machine.
According to the date, find your wanted version of the History.db file that contains your deleted Safari browsing history.

restore Safari history.db file with TimeMachine

Once the Time Machine restoring process is done, you will get back all your browser data. The next time you open Safari, you will see the browsing history.

However, if you haven't created a Time Machine backup beforehand, this approach to recover the deleted Safari history on Mac might prove to be useless. Then try the last resort - using iCloud to retrieve the Safari history.

Method 3: Recover MacBook deleted Safari history with iCloud

If you're using iCloud to synchronize your Safari history across your Mac and iPhone. Then you may have another option to restore the Safari browsing data from your iPhone to your Mac.

Here are the steps to recover the Safari history by using iCloud Sync:

Launch the iPhone Settings menu on your iPhone.
Tap on your name to open Apple Profile.
Select on iCloud and scroll to the Safari app.
Enable the toggle button for Safari iCloud data sync.
Select the Keep on My iPhone option.

Now all your Safari history present on the iPhone will be overwritten on the iCloud, replacing the one from Mac. Open the Safari browser on Mac, the merged Safari history will be synchronized automatically.

Hope one of the methods mentioned above is helpful to recover the deleted Safari history. If you're not so lucky to have a TimeMachine backup or iCloud Sync beforehand, then using a Mac data software to retrieve the Safari deleted history is your best choice.

How to Recover Deleted Notes on Mac?

Have you deleted notes on Mac by mistake? This article tells how to recover deleted/disappeared notes on Mac.

Anna Yuan is a professional tech editor at iBoysoft who specializes in writing articles related to software, macOS, Windows OS, Apple products, and Windows computers. Furthermore, she writes articles for some well-known tech websites. And as she has been a Mac user for many years, she's highly willing to share information on Mac utilities and tips.

Jessica Shee is a senior tech editor at iBoysoft. Throughout her 4 years of experience, Jessica has written many informative and instructional articles in data recovery, data security, and disk management to help a lot of readers secure their important documents and take the best advantage of their devices.

No. 308, 3/F, Unit 1, Building 6, No. 1700, Tianfu Avenue North, High-tech Zone

How to Find Deleted History on Mac and iOS Device (Safari)

Quick Navigation

Part I. How to Find Deleted Safari History on Mac without Time Machine

Part ii. recover deleted safari history on mac with time machine, part iii. recover deleted history on iphone/ipad (safari).

Sometimes you may accidentally delete the browsing history on your Mac or your iPhone, and you want to recover them. Or you intentionally erase the browser history on Safari to free up the storage space, but you find some website data still useful afterwards and you want to restore it. No matter what situations you are facing, if you are searching for the methods of how to recover deleted Safari history on Mac or iPhone/iPad , here is the right article for you.

You can use either Mac's own backup service Time Machine or the third-party software to find the deleted history on Mac for Safari . Read on to check the specific steps. Workarounds for recovering deleted history on iPhone or iPad for Safari are also listed.

People Also Read : How to Recover Deleted History on Google Chrome (opens new window)

If you have made a backup of the Safari browsing history on your Mac, you can use Time Machine to restore all the deleted data. But what if you haven't? FonePaw Data Recovery (opens new window) , a powerful third-party data recovery application, can give a great help to easily get the deleted Safari history back. It can recover the database file, local files of deleted history , bookmarks of Safari on Mac. Then you can open the recovered files to look up the deleted history (url, date, etc.)

Download and launch FonePaw Data Recovery on you Mac. Then follow the steps below to find the deleted Safari history.

Free Download Buy with 20% off

Step 1: In the main interface, choose the data type and location of lost data you want to recover. Here for deleted deleted history on Safari , select "Other" and the disk with Safari installed on your Mac.

Choose to Recover Deleted Browsing History

Step 2: Click on "Scan" at the right bottom to scan the data. FonePaw Data Recovery will start the Quick Scan automatically. After that, you are able to select "Deep Scan" to search out more deleted files. Deep Scan could takes several hours depending on the disk storage.

Step 3: After the scan process, to find the deleted Safari history on Mac, in the search bar, type in " /Library/Safari " and then click on "Filter".

Step 4: Among all the filtered files, locate the file(s) with the " .db " suffix. Note that if you are using older versions of Safari, you may have to find the files with the suffix of " .plist " instead.

Step 5: Select the ".db" or ".plist" file and click on "Recover" at the right bottom to get the deleted Safari history back.

To see the deleted history on Safari , you may use SQlite browser to open and view the db. file, from which you can see the information of the deleted history, including URL, date, time. To open .plist files, you can use a text editor or plist editor.

Besides deleted history of Safari, FonePaw Data Recovery can recover deleted photos, emails, Word, Excel, PDF, PPT, and more from Mac.

Time Machine is the backup service offered by Macs. You can retrieve all deleted files, including the deleted Safari history on your Mac through that, as long as you've made a backup of those data. So before the recovery process, make sure that your Mac has set up Time Machine backup.

Pay attention that by using Time Machine, since all the deleted Safari history will be restored completely, the current Safari website data should also have a backup in order not to be eliminated by the recovered data.

Get your Mac and Time Machine ready and follow the steps below to recover the deleted Safari History.

Step 1: Quit Safari and open Time Machine to the Mac.

Step 2: Open Finder and pull down "Go" menu.

Step 3: Choose "Go To Folder" and type in " ~/Library/Safari/ ", and then hit "Go".

Step 4: In the Safari directory interface, locate and select " History.db " file. If you are using older versions of Safari, the file name might be " History.plist " instead.

Step 5: Pull down Time Machine menu from the top of the screen and click on "Enter Time Machine".

Step 6: In Time Machine, scroll through all the Safari history data until you find the browsing date that you want to recover. Click on "Restore" to restore the data.

After the restoring process, open Safari on the Mac. Pull down "History" menu and click "Show All History" . Now you can see all the previous browsing history will be retrieved on Safari.

What if the problem happened on iPhone or iPad, instead of Mac? Is it still possible to find the deleted Safari history back on iPhone, iPad? Sure. Basically it's the same thing.

But one thing to make sure is that all the browsing history data should have the backup, so that they can be restored.

Solution 1. Head to Settings > Safari > Advanced > Website Data.

Solution 2. Open iCloud.com. Log in your iCloud account and go to "Advanced Settings". And then select "Restore Bookmark".

Solution 3. Use FonePaw iPhone Data Recovery (opens new window) to retrieve the deleted Safari history from iTunes backup and iPhone or iPad itself. See also: Safari History Recovery: Recover Deleted History on iPhone (opens new window) .

Is any method above helpful for you to get the deleted Safari history back on Mac, iPhone, iPad? Do you have other good solutions to this problem? Welcome to leave a comment below to let us know!

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How to Recover Deleted History on Mac Google Chrome or Safari

Mar 14, 2024 • Filed to: Solve Mac Problems • Proven solutions

Can browsing history be recovered once it is deleted?

The Internet browsing or search history on your Mac browser is probably the one thing that you do not care a lot about and neither does anyone else. We do not think twice before deleting our Internet history from Safari or Google Chrome, do we? However, this is not the best thing to do.

How many times has it happened that you forgot a particular website that you visited, but there was no way to know what it was since you deleted your search history ? More than a few times at least. There are times when you may want to see what someone was doing on a Mac by checking the Internet browser history, and many other things. The bottom line is if the Chrome or Safari history is deleted, can you recover deleted history on Google Chrome or Safari? Here we will give you an answer about how to recover deleted Internet history on Mac .

Method 1. Recover Deleted Chrome History with Google My Activity

Method 2. recover deleted chrome history using browser cookies, method 3. recover deleted internet history from icloud.

Method 4: Recover Deleted Internet History from Time Machine Backup
Bonus 1: How to Check History on Google Chrome and Safari
Bonus 2: Tips for Recovering Lost Data on Mac

You can recover deleted Internet history on Mac, and there are no complicated steps involved in this! Let us go ahead and see some of the easiest and most effective ways on how to recover deleted Internet history on Mac . Before we move ahead, it is essential to know that Internet history is stored on your Mac hard drive. So recovering the Internet history is like recovering data on Mac including Mac photo recovery or Mac file recovery.

Google My Activity is able to uncover your most recent search activities, but it requires you to have signed in to your Google account before the browsing history is erased.

To retrieve deleted Chrome History using Google My Activity on a Mac, follow these steps:

Open Google Chrome and log in to your Google account.
Navigate to Google My Activity.
Here, you will find a display of all your Google activities, including visited pages, YouTube history, and more. You can restore your Chrome history by filtering based on date and product.

recover deleted chrome history using google my activity

On your Mac, you have the option to recover deleted Chrome history using browser cookies as well. Follow these steps:

Open Google Chrome and click on the three dots located in the top right corner.
Select Settings -> Privacy and Security -> Cookies and other site data.
Next, click on "See all cookies and site data."
You will now be able to view a list of Chrome browsing history cookies, each associated with the domain name of the visited website.

recover deleted chrome history using cookies

If you use the same Apple account for your Mac and iPhone or iPad, and have Safari sync enabled in iCloud, you can attempt to sync your Safari history back to your Mac. Follow these steps:

Access Settings on your iPhone or iPad.
Tap on the avatar to access the Apple ID management page.
Choose iCloud and scroll to locate the Safari app.
Enable the toggle switch to synchronize the Safari iCloud data.
Opt for the "Keep on My iPhone" option and then select Merge.

Once done, you can review the Safari history on your iPhone or iPad to check if the deleted history has been recovered.

Method 4: How to Recover Deleted Internet History from Time Machine Backup

Time Machine is an inbuilt utility on Mac PCs that can be used to back up and recover deleted or lost files on Mac . What makes Time Machine such a convenient way to recover deleted history on Mac ? It does not require any installation and can be used without configuring anything else on your Mac. To use Time Machine for getting back your deleted history on Mac, you just need to follow the steps as given ahead:

Step 1. Ensure that Time Machine is ON In case you have not switched on this feature yet, then you will need to go to the Time Machine menu, which can be found under Menu > Systems. If the switch is set to "Off", set it to "On" to enable Time Machine.

how to recover deleted internet history on Mac - ensure time machine is on

Step 2. Open Time Machine Once Time Machine is enabled and set up on your PC, go to the Enter Time Machine option situated in the Time Machine drop-down menu. Once you select that, your Mac will connect to the backup location.

how to recover deleted internet history on mac - open time machine

Step 3. Select the backup or snapshot that you are looking for Once you have opened Time Machine, it will show you a list of all the snapshots and backups that it has taken. Within the windows that pop up, find the one that has Applications to get the snapshots taken from Safari or Google Chrome, and recover the deleted history from the "Recover" button given under it.

how to recover deleted internet history on mac - select backup

Method 5: How to Recover Deleted History on Chrome or Safari Easily

If you are trying to recover deleted history on Mac , then Time Machine, though a handy option, may not be that effective in most cases. To recover deleted history on Mac with the most effective results, professional Mac data recovery software is what you need - and this is where Recoverit Mac Data Recovery comes in.

I: Recoverit Makes Browser History Recovery Easier

Browser history recovery on Mac is quite easy if you have Recoverit. It utilizes the all-around scan and deep scan algorithm to dig out your deleted or lost data on your storage device, piece them together, and show you. It just takes 3 steps - select > scan > recover, and your deleted Internet search or browsing history can be retrieved within a few minutes.

II: Steps on How to Recover Chrome or Safari History on Mac

Download and install Recoverit Data Recovery for Mac, and then follow the next steps to perform Internet history recovery on Mac . If you are working on Windows computer, please download Recoverit Data Recovery for Windows and follow the same steps.

Step 1 Select the Mac hard drive with browser data

Launch Recoverit Browser History Recovery first. To recover Chrome history or Safari history , you need to select the location where the browsing or search data were lost or deleted. Click the " Start " button to get started.

Step 2 Scan the browser hard drive

Later, an all-around scan will be initiated on your Mac hard drive with Chrome or Safari Internet history. To restore the history data , please leave it scanning and wait for a while.

Step 3 Recover deleted history on Mac

After the scanning, you can select your Internet history files and click " Recover " button to get them back. For the sake of safety, you should put them in another safe location.

With Recoverit Mac Data Recovery , you can get the deleted or lost data files back in simple steps. Download and try it for free now.

Bonus 1: How to Find and Check History on Mac

If you do not delete or clear your Chrome or Safari history and just want to access the history, you can follow the below steps to get the desired results.

I: How to Check History on Safari

Open the Safari and click Safari on the menu bar.
From the drop-down menu, click "Preferences" and go to the "Privacy" tab.
Here, you can view all the cookies. Click "Manage Website Data".
You can see all the websites and browsing history on your Safari.

II: How to View History on Chrome

Open Google Chrome and click "History" on the menu bar.
Click "Show Full History" to view a list of Chrome browser history you recently visited or closed.
You can also use the keyboard shortcuts - "Command + Y" to open the Chrome history.
Search some keywords to help you find the wanted history more quickly.

After the above steps, we believe that you probably manage to view browsing history on Mac Google Chrome or Safari. Find them deleted or lost? Go to download Recoverit Mac Data Recovery . It can recover deleted files, photos, videos, and many more types of data within a few minutes.

Note To restore Chrome or Safari easily, free download the Mac data recovery software and try it right away.

Bonus 2: Tips for Browser History Recovery on Mac

Using Time Machine or a Mac Data Recovery software like Recoverit Data Recovery for Mac surely comes across as an easy way to get back all your lost files. With these options, here are a few tips that you can follow to maximize your chances of recovering your deleted history :

Regularly back up all your important Mac data to an external location, including your Internet history.
When you recover your Internet history or any other file on Mac, do not recover it back to the same location where it was before deletion.
Avoid installing any unauthorized software or any third-party disk cleanup utilities.
Always properly switch off the Mac, as switching it off by taking off the power supply could cause data loss.
While using Recoverit Data Recovery to limit the memory area and file type to look for, if possible, to speed up results.

Thus, with these basic things taken care of, you will recover deleted history on Mac Google Chrome or Safari with ease and with the best positive results!

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Recovering Deleted Safari Browsing History on a Mac

Over the years, we’ve provided a lot of tips on how to recover space on your Mac , one of which is to delete your browsing history in Safari. That’s all fine and good, and it will definitely open up megabytes of space, but what if that browsing history was your only link to an important website or page? Today we’re going to look at how to recover a deleted Safari browsing history.

Restore From Time Machine

To restore your deleted Safari history, you’re going to need a Time Machine backup or another backup file from before the date that you deleted your browsing history. (note that this isn’t always the case on public machines like those at a library or school). If the Mac is only used by you or a small group of users, and you have Time Machine backups running constantly, then this is the method to use.

If Safari is currently open, quit out of it. Next, click and hold on the Finder icon (the smiling face at the far left side of the Dock) until the pop-up menu appears, then select “New Finder Window”.
A Finder window appears on the screen. Go to the menu bar, select Go > Go to Folder, type in ~/Library/Safari (see screenshot below), and then click the Go button.

Enter this path in the Go to Folder dialog, then click the Go button

This opens the Finder window to the ~/Library/Safari directory.
Make sure that the Time Machine icon appears on the right side of your Mac menu bar. If it doesn’t, launch System Preferences, then Time Machine, and then check the box next to “Show Time Machine in menu bar”
In the open Finder window, find the file named “History.db”. Click it once to select it, then select “Enter Time Machine” from the Time Machine menu (see screenshot below).

Select History.db, then choose Enter Time Machine from the Time Machine menu

Once Time Machine is open, a list of all backups of the History.db file appears (see screenshot below). You’ll want to use the up arrow to go “back in time” to an earlier date before you deleted your Safari browsing history, and then click the Restore button. Note that if you’re looking from a Safari browsing history from a long time ago, it’s possible to use the slider on the far right of the Time Machine screen to go back months or years.

Time Machine displays a history of the files in the Safari folder.

Once Time Machine has restored the “History.db” file, launch Safari.
From the menubar for Safari, select History > Show All History. A grid-like list of your browsing history appears in a browser window, showing all of the visits you’ve made on your journey around the web (see image below).

One comment about that History.db file. It’s actually an SQLite database file and can be queried or searched with almost any SQL database tool, including this free app – DB Browser for SQLite. However, it’s much easier for most users to simply use the search bar in the upper right corner of the History window to search for a particular item.

If you don’t have a Time Machine backup or another backup from an earlier time, there’s really no way to recover your browsing history. This is yet another reason why we constantly recommend getting an inexpensive external drive, hooking it to your Mac, and then setting up Time Machine to back up the device continuously.

A Note About DB Browser for SQLite

Curious about your browsing history? For example, perhaps you’d like to know how many times you’ve visited a specific web page. The app discussed in the previous section—DB Browser for SQLite—is a handy tool for getting some information from the History.db file that might be useful.

After downloading and installing DB Browser for SQLite, launch the app, find the History.db file (the first part of this article shows you how to do this), then drag it to the DB Browser window. The file opens in the Database Structure view; what most users want to do is browser the data stored in one of the SQLite tables.

As an example, I’ve opened the History.db file in DB Browser, then selected the history_items table from the Table pop-up list. The screenshot below shows the contents of that table, which include an ID number, the URL of a visited site, a “domain_expansion” for each site, and various other columns in this table.

I don’t recommend using DB Browser for SQLite for anything other than just browsing the History.db file unless you really know what you’re doing! If you decide to play with deleting records, be sure to have a backup of History.db in case you corrupt it.

Originally posted July 13, 2018

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9 ways | how to recover deleted history on safari (iphone/mac).

Can i recover deleted history on safari.

Recover deleted Safari history on Mac
Recover deleted Safari history on iPhone/iPad

Feel regretful having deleted the browsing history on Safari? Or get troubled by accidentally erasing all of your Safari history? This blog must be your landing page. Whether it’s on an iPhone or on a Mac, missing Safari history tends to cause inconvenience when we try to visit a precious website or collect some used URLs.

To address this issue, here we’ll get you covered with a handful of tips on how to recover deleted Safari history on iOS device or on Mac . There’s always one solution for you.

Cisdem Data Recovery for Mac

Recover deleted safari history on mac easily.

Restore deleted Safari history, Safari bookmark, Chrome history , Chrome bookmark , etc.
Recover 200+ files: video, audio, photo, document, email, archive ,etc.
Recover data from iCloud
Fix damaged videos and photos
Recover unsaved Word, Excel, PowerPoint documents
Create backup from disk and restore files with disk image
Preview files before recovering
Recover files to local folder or Cloud platforms

Yes, you can.

But the success rate is not 100%. When your browsing history is cleared from Safari, rather than going away forever, it will be temporarily stored in another different part of your device’s memory. The time limit of storage is around one month for iPhone/iPad, up to one year for Mac. So if you’re within the specific period, waste no time, still you’ll have a big chance to get back your deleted Safari history.

How to recover deleted Safari history on Mac?

With respect to Safari history recovery on Mac, we have gathered 4 methods at your disposal, by which you can choose to restore disappeared Safari history on Mac with or without Time Machine backup.

#1 Recover deleted Safari history on Mac with Time Machine

Time Machine is known to be a useful utility that creates incremental backups of files that can be restored at a later date on macOS system. If you’ve got into the habit of running Time Machine constantly on Mac, congratulations, your deleted Safari history could be resumed simply via Time Machine.

How to recover deleted Safari history on Mac with Time Machine?

Quit Safari if it’s open.
Connect your Time Machine backup hard drive with Mac.

Now relaunch Safari browser, go to History > Show All History to check the recovered history.

#2 Recover deleted Safari history on Mac without Time Machine

Provided that no Time Machine backup is available, proceed to have a look at other 3 options as below.

Option 1: Restore deleted Safari history using software

We will start off with a piece of dedicated data recovery software --- Cisdem Data Recovery for Mac . Designed with modern user interface, advanced scanning engine, and high recovery rate, this top-ranked program is capable of restoring 200+ file types, including deleted or lost history files of different browsers like Safari, Google Chrome, Firefox, also documents, photos, videos, audios, emails, archives, etc.

Better yet, users take little technical knowledge to deal with any tricky data loss situations: emptied Trash Bin, mistaken deletion, formatting, system crash, virus infection, power surge, firmware damage, human error, etc. Cisdem Data Recovery is always here to offer the most suitable recovery solutions.

How to find deleted Safari history on Mac without Time Machine?

Choose a reliable recovery destination and click Save. To view the deleted history on Safari again, you’re obliged to copy the recovered History.db file into ~/Library/Safari folder and overwrite that current file.

Option 2. Find deleted history on Safari by cookies

Apart from using software, another approach you can try is checking cookies of Safari browser to find the missing history. Cookies are those mini files websites use to store certain data including URLs. But bear in mind that this method is not guaranteed to work out. That’s because the cookies you’ve found might get corrupted sometimes or not store your browsing history at all. Anyway, it’s worth a shot.

Open Safari on your Mac.

Option 3. Retrieve deleted Safari history from iCloud Sync

The final recovery option on Mac actually involves in other iOS devices. Suppose you have Safari sync initialed in iCloud across your Mac and iPhone/iPad, there’s an opportunity to recover the deleted Safari history from iOS to Mac. Since the original browsing history data are still in your mobile, it’s achievable to force iPhone/iPad to overwrite Safari history in iCloud and replace the one from Mac by iCloud Sync.

On your iPhone or iPad, head over to Settings > Apple Profile > iCloud.

Until now launch your Safari on Mac, the deleted Safari history will be synchronized and recovered automatically.

How to recover deleted Safari history on iPhone/iPad?

When it comes to recovering deleted Safari history on iPhone or iPad, we can get through the problem with or without backup.

#1 Recover deleted Safari history on iPhone/iPad without backup

For those Safari users who need to regain their deleted browsing history but have no backup in hand, we will recommend them to make use of an iPhone data recovery tool, recover in Safari app directly, or recover from iPhone Settings. Let’s dive into the details.

Option 1. Recover with iOS data recovery tool

Among numerous iOS data recovery programs in the market, you’d better try Cisdem iPhone Data Recovery --- UltData at first. It’s a professional recovery tool coming to rescue your various types of data, including Safari history, Safari bookmarks, messages, contacts, call history, reminders and more. Recovering lost files only takes a few clicks with user-friendly operation.

How to recover deleted Safari history on iPhone without backup?

Option 2. Recover in Safari app

In the event that your history was deleted from Safari very recently, one simple trick is to find it directly in Safari app of your iPhone. Here’s the guide on how to recover deleted history in Safari .

Open Safari on your iPhone.

Option 3. Recover from iPhone Settings

Without any backup, another straightforward way to restore history on Safari is recovering from Settings on iPhone/iPad. One obvious shortcoming is that this solution is feasible only if you haven't cleared the browser cache or cookies. If you fit the bill, proceed to take the steps.

#2 Recover deleted Safari history on iPhone/iPad with backup

Things will become much easier once you have made any backups of Safari browsing history prior to the deletion on iPhone/iPad. Likewise, the recovery process can be carried out with or without the aid of computer.

Option 1. Access deleted Safari history without computer

Usually, iOS device users prefer iCloud Backup for protecting their data. If you’d like to finish the Safari history recovery on iPhone/iPad alone, a feature named “Restore from iCloud Backup” on iOS will be put into handy use. Since this belongs to a complete restoration that will reset all your current settings and files, remember to back up the existing iOS data before trying this method.

How to recover deleted Safari history on iPhone without computer (iCloud Backup)?

Enter your Apple ID password to start the erasing.

Sign into iCloud with your Apple account.
Select the exact backup created before you lost your browsing history on Safari. Then the deleted history files will show up again on your iPhone/iPad.

Option 2. Recover deleted history on Safari with computer

Alternatively, assuming you have ever backed up your iPhone or iPad with iTunes app on the computer, this approach is for you. Restoring Safari history from iTunes backup will erase the original data as well, thus you’re supposed to make a full backup preparation before starting to do the recovery.

How to recover deleted Safari history from iPhone with computer (iTunes Backup)?

Connect the iPhone/iPad to your computer.

Don’t freak out when realizing your Safari history missing somehow. In this page we’ve hopefully rounded up several practical recovery tips under given scenarios. No matter where you deleted the Safari browsing history: on Mac or on iOS device , you can pick at least one helpful solution here.

Connie has been writing for Mac productivity and utility apps since 2009. Each review and solution is based on her practical tests, she is aways energetic and trustworthy in this field.

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How to Recover Deleted Safari, Chrome Browser History

Summary: Accidentally deleted or lost the search history on Safari or Chrome browser on macOS? Don’t worry. This post guides you on various ways to recover deleted Safari and Chrome history on Mac. It also answers common queries related to the browser history issue.

Can I recover deleted Safari history?

Methods to recover browsing history on mac.

Safari and Chrome keep a log of all the websites you visited in the past, including details of your confidential browsing data on Mac. However, after macOS update, crash, reset, erase, or search history deletion, you lose your favorite bookmarks and other browsing history. Web browsing history is important in many ways. It helps in quick download of your favorite and frequently visited websites. You can also keep track of the browsing activities of other users on your MacBook. And just in case you forget an important website link, search history comes to your rescue.

So, if you are already frustrated by the accidental deletion or loss of Safari/ Chrome browser history on Mac, know how to recover it.

‘I accidentally deleted Safari browser history on my MacBook Pro. It contained details of a few important websites I visited last week but don’t remember their names or URL anymore. Is there a way to recover or view my lost Safari history? Thanks.’

Like any other data, the Safari or Chrome browser history is stored on your Mac SSD or hard drive. So, if you delete the browser history from your Mac , intentionally or accidentally, you can recover it using standard Mac data recovery methods.

The next section describes various methods to recover your deleted Safari and Chrome browser history in macOS.

1. Free Recover Safari history using Time Machine

Time Machine is an incremental backup and restoration application integrated with your Mac. If you have set up your Time Machine backup hard drive, you can restore deleted browser history instantly.

The steps to recover deleted Safari history with Time Machine are as follows:

Quit the Safari application if it is open on your macOS.
Connect the Time Machine backup hard drive to Mac.
Go to Finder > Go > Go To Folder . In the text box, enter the path: ~/Library/Safari/
In the Safari directory, select the History.db file.
On the Menu Bar , go to Time Machine > Enter Time Machine .
In Time Machine, use the Timeline or Up/Down arrow to navigate to the date that contains Safari history data.
Click Restore to recover deleted browser history.
Now, relaunch Safari, click History from the menu bar, and select Show All History . Verify your restored browser history.

The process of deleted browser history recovery with Time Machine is simple. However, it will work if you have enabled Time Machine backup before deleting browser search history on Mac.

2. Use Google My Activity to recover Chrome history on Mac

Google My Activity helps to rediscover your last search activities. But the option will only work if you have signed in to your Google account before deleting the browsing history.

Steps to recover deleted Chrome history with Google My Activity on Mac:

Sign in to your Google account from Chrome.
Visit Google My Activity .
Your Google activities, such as the web pages you had visited, your locations, YouTube history, etc. will be displayed. You can filter and view your Google activities by date and product.

3. Recover lost Chrome history using browser cookies

You can also restore deleted Chrome history with browser cookies on Mac. Browser cookies are files stored on your computer as you surf the web.

Steps to recover deleted Chrome history on Mac with browser cookies:

Open Google Chrome and click on the 3 dots in the top-right.
From the drop-down, click Settings .
Scroll down to Privacy and Security and click Cookies and other site data .
In the next window, click See all cookies and site data .
The list of Chrome browsing history cookies appears. Scroll through each and click on the required cookie.
You’ll see the domain name of the visited website.

4. Recover deleted Safari and Chrome history with software

Try a free data recovery software for Mac to recover your deleted Safari or Chrome browser history. A recovery software retrieves all the lost or deleted History.db files of Safari, Chrome, and other browsers from your Mac.

History.db is a SQLite database file. You can open it in any SQL database tool like DB Browser for SQLite. The Mac data recovery software is compatible with Ventura, Monterey, Big Sur, Catalina, Mojave, and earlier macOS.

Steps to recover the deleted browsing history files with software are as follows:

Step 1: Download and install Stellar Data Recovery Free Edition for Mac on your MacBook, iMac, or Mac mini.

Step 2: Launch the software, and from the Select What To Recover screen, choose Recover Everything and click Next .

Step 3: From the Select Location screen, select Macintosh HD the startup drive. Toggle on Deep Scan and click Scan . Wait until the scan completes.

Step 4 : Scan result displays the deleted files on Mac. Use the search box to find the history.db files. Select the desired browser history file and click Recover . You can also preview the .db file in text editor in the software.

Step 5: In the dialog box, click Browse to specify a location to save the browser history file and click Save .

Next, navigate to the save location to view the browser history file. You can open the Safari history file in DB Browser for SQLite, SQLite Studio, or HeidiSQL etc.

Alternatively, to open the database file in Safari, copy the History.db file to ~/Library/Safari .

Whereas to open Chrome browser history file, copy it to /Library/Application Support/Google/Chrome/Default.

*Stellar Data Recovery Free Edition for Mac allows you to recover up to 1 GB of data for Free. However, to recover unlimited data you need to activate the software . Also, the software comes with a 30-day money-back guarantee.

1. How do I recover deleted Safari history on Mac without Time Machine?

In the absence of Time Machine backup, recover deleted Safari browser history using data recovery software such as Stellar Data Recovery for Mac.

2. How do I recover deleted Safari history on iPhone?

You can recover Safari history on iPhone from iCloud backup . If you don’t find it in iCloud, use Stellar Data Recovery for iPhone . The software recovers Safari bookmarks and other data in no time from all variants of iPhone.

3. How can I prevent Safari browser history loss?

To avoid loss of Safari browser history, backup browsing history in Time Machine. iPhone and iPad users can turn on Safari backup in iCloud backup and sync to access browsing history across their devices.

4. How can I recover more than 1 GB of data with Stellar Data Recovery software?

To recover more than 1 GB of data, you have to upgrade to Professional or Premium editions of the software.

5. How to erase my browsing history on Chrome?

You can erase browsing history from the Chrome Settings, which lets you delete the browsing history, cache data, cookies, passwords, etc. However, to permanently erase your browsing history on Mac, use a data erasure software that wipes the browsing history beyond recovery by any tool. Learn more.

About The Author

Vishal is a data recovery expert @Stellar. He addresses data loss scenarios on a Mac. He intends to help people solve their macOS problems. Besides, Vishal prefers to read about astronomy and autobiography, and his favorite is Steve Jobs - The man who thought different written by Karen Bluementhal.

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How to Recover Deleted Safari History on Mac

How many of you have wished to get your Mac’s Safari history back?

Perhaps you mistakenly wiped all history & web data or removed particular Safari history, and now you want to undo those actions and reclaim your browser history?

Or maybe you’re conducting some light forensic work for whatever reason, or you’d like to experiment with some fundamental computer forensics for Safari internet history on a Mac?

Read: How to delete specific Safari history?

We’ll teach you how to restore lost Safari history on a Mac in a few easy steps.

Because we want to keep things simple, we’ll use Time Machine, Mac’s backup service, which also happens to be the easiest method to recover lost Safari history – or any other deleted file, for such a matter – although our emphasis now is on the Safari internet browser.

As a result, this method necessitates the usage of a Time Machine backup on the Mac in the issue. This basic history recovery solution will not work if the Mac doesn’t have a Time Travel backup installed and frequent backups.

Because this restores from a backup, all data between the time the backup was created and the time the restoration occurred will be lost, so bear that in mind before starting this procedure, especially if the current browsing history is critical – you should back it up first.

Safari History

Safari history is a databases file that stores the websites you’ve visited before. Like most other online browsers, Safari retains a history file by default. As a result, visitors will find it simpler to return to familiar destinations without re-enter their addresses.

On a Mac, how can I locate and access Safari’s history?

There are usually two methods on a Mac or MacBook to access Safari history. One option is to use Safari to look into it. Another option is to use Finder to locate the Safari History.db file.

In Safari, look for the following:

On your Mac, launch Safari.
Choose the History option from the menu bar.
From the drop-down option, choose View Entire History.

Then a table with two parts and many rows will appear.

The names of the sites you’ve previously visited are shown in the initial column from the left, and they’re arranged by date, whereas the second column lists their entire URLs.

When Can Safari History Be Recovered? How Can Safari History Be Lost and When Can It Be Recovered?

Let’s look at some of the most frequent causes for erasing Safari history and how to restore it:

Intent Removal: Many Safari customers want to keep their browser history as clean as possible so that others can’t look into their online activities. That’s fine until you need the URL of a webpage you visited years ago and can’t recall.
Browsing in Private Mode: You may start a Private Window (Command+Shift+N) in Safari to prevent your browsing history from being saved. Users of Safari may be unaware that they are viewing the web in the Personal Window & wonder why their browser history isn’t being saved.
Deleted by mistake: If you accidentally remove your Safari history, all you have to do is click the Clean History option and confirm your choice. By default, Safari deletes just the latest hour of browser history, but you may order it to erase all information at once. Frequently, customers want to remove just the previous hour but fail to realize that the choice to erase the entire history is chosen, resulting in their complete browser history being erased instantly.
Cybercriminals: Because most fraudsters target Windows machines, Mac users are reasonably protected from viruses, but this does not imply they are entirely safe. There are a variety of cyber threats that may lead Mac users to erase their entire Safari internet history in the blink of an eye, from malware to remote desktop attacks.
Formatting: When reinstalling macOS, it’s occasionally a good idea to format the system disk first so you can start fresh. It suffices to say that resetting wipes away Safari history and all other data on the hard disk.

The Simple Way to Recover Lost Safari History on a Mac

Here’s how to retrieve lost Safari history on a Mac, assuming you have a Time Machine backup:

If you haven’t done so previously, close Safari on MacOS.
If it isn’t already connected, attach the Time Machine backup disk to the Mac.
Pull down the “Go” menu in the Finder and choose “Go To Folder,” then input the following path:

~/Library/Safari/

Select the “History.db” file in the /Library/Safari directory, then pull down on The time Machine option in the top right side and pick “Enter Time Machine.”
Browse and scroll through to the Time Machine record of the /Library/Safari/ directory, then select the “Restore” button in Time Machine when you find the chosen date that includes the Safari history data you’d want to retrieve.
You may now view the newly restored copy of the lost Safari history once Time Machine completes restoring the /Library/Safari/ directory.
Relaunch Safari on your Mac, and the newly restored History will be visible.
Pull down the “History” menu in Safari and choose “Show All History.”
You may now browse, search, and discover particular Safari history from the recovered Safari History.db file the same way you would normally.

That’s all; you’ve now recovered the Safari browser history that was accidentally lost!

You’re searching for the “History.db” file in the /Library/Safari/ folder on the Mac, which may be relatively large depending on how much online surfing you perform. It’s just a data file that you can search directly with SQL. Still, we’re not going to do it here since you can also access, search, and browse via Safari history in Safari on the Mac, and we’re trying to keep things simple for this tutorial.

This method will only recover and restore Safari browser history that has been deleted or erased from the Mac; it will not recover a secret session in which no history has been produced.

There would have been no history information to recover from Time Machine if you had used Private Surfing in Safari for Mac to avoid history from being collected in the first place.

Consumers can always seek Safari History on their iPhone or iPad and remove specific browser history using the iOS Safari browser.

Still, to recover removed Safari history in iOS, you’d need to be able to recover a device using an iCloud or iTunes backup that included the lost Safari history.

This solution is for the Mac, but a similar way could potentially be used for iOS. However, it is a subject for another essay. Therefore, it will not be explored here.

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[2024] How to Recover Deleted/Lost Safari History on Mac/iPhone

Category: PC Data Recovery

May 7, 2024 5 mins read

Safari history is a very useful feature as it allows you to quickly find the websites that you visited before and now want to visit again but don’t remember the address. In some cases, Mac users want to recover history on a Mac to find the sites that they visited before, even though the history has been accidently cleared.

For example, one user asked "Is there any way to recover my Safari browsing history if I erased it by mistake so I can find back the site that I visited before?" Fortunately, it is possible to recover cleared Safari history. Read on to learn where is Safari history stored on Mac, how to find it, as well as the different ways to recover Safari history Mac.

In this article:

Part 1. How to Find Safari History on Mac

Part 3. How to Check Deleted History on Safari on Mac for Free

3.1 Restore Deleted Safari History on Mac by Time Machine
3.2 See Lost Safari History on Mac Via Cookies

Bonus Tip: Recover Deleted/Lost Safari History on iPhone

Many Mac users may wonder where safari search history is stored on Mac. Apparently, finding history on Safari is quite straightforward as all you need to do is navigate to the Preferences section and then manage the history files from there.

Follow these instructions to find Safari history Mac:

Launch Safari on your Mac.
Use Command + Comma (,) buttons on your Mac’s keyboard to navigate to the Preferences section. Alternatively, you can use the menu bar of the browser to do this.
Once in the Preferences section, choose the General tab and then click on the option called Remove history items. With that option, you can either set the history to be automatically cleared after a certain time or set it to clear manually.
If you want to search your history or delete the records related to visited websites selectively, then press Command + Y keys on your Mac’s keyboard while the Safari browser is running and it will take you to the history view.

Part 2. How to Recover Deleted/Lost Safari History on Mac with Software

Using a data recovery tool is another reliable way to see your deleted/lost Safari history Mac. Data recovery software allows you to recover virtually all kinds of data, including search history. So, it is likely that you will be able to perform successful data recovery.

iMyFone D-Back is a recommended tool that you can use for Safari history Mac recovery. Choosing this tool is recommended because of its ease of use, cost, and variety of advantages that other data recovery tools generally lack. Available for Mac, iMyFone D-Back uses advanced data recovery algorithm to find and recover history on Safari with high success rate.

Key Features

Recover deleted/lost Safari data on your Mac, such as browsing history, cookies, etc.
Before recovering, you can freely scan your data in Safari history while previewing it to determine what data can be recovered.
Supported Mac devices include MacBook, MacBook Pro, MacBook Air, Mac Mini, and more.
The iMyFone D-back data hard drive doesn't only work with files on Windows/Mac, but it can also help you to recover data from SD cards, hard drives, cameras, etc.

Try It Free

Steps to Recover Deleted/Lost Safari History on Mac Via iMyFone D-Back:

Step 1: Download, install, and launch iMyFone D-Back on your Mac. From its home interface, navigate to the folder where your Safari browsing data was located.

Step 2: iMyFone D-Back will start the scanning process.Once you find deleted/lost Safari history, stop the scanning process, select the file and click on the Recover button.

Step 3: In the end, select the path or location where you want to restore the search history on Mac and click on the OK button. Your data will be available at the selected location on your device.

1 Restore Deleted Safari History on Mac by Time Machine

Time Machine is a very useful tool on Mac that allows you to create and restore backups in an efficient and convenient manner. You can use it to restore your deleted Safari search history on Mac, providing that Time Machine was enabled and backup was created before the deletion of your Safari history.

Follow these instructions to restore deleted Safari history via Time Machine on Mac:

Step 1: First, make sure that the Time Machine feature is on/enabled on your Mac. To do this, launch Time Machine and navigate to Menu > Systems. Once there, toggle the switch to On if it is currently at Off position. This will enable Time Machine.

recover cleared safari history mac - Turn On Time Machine

Step 2: Next, navigate to Time Machine option that manages the backups. You can find it in the Time Machine drop-down menu. Once you navigate to that section, you will be automatically connected to the backup location.

how to recover deleted browsing safari history on mac - Enter Time Machine

Step 3: Once you see a list of all the backups and snapshots that Time Machine has taken, find and navigate to the Applications window. Once there, look for the snapshots taken by Safari and then use the Restore button under it to start recovering the deleted Safari history.

how to recover deleted safari browser history on mac - Select Backups

This method to recover deleted Safari history only works if Time Machine was enabled before your web history got erased.

2 See Lost Safari History on Mac Via Cookies

As mentioned before, if the Time Machine on your Mac was not enabled before the deletion of your search history, then you won’t be able to recover the history on Safari via that method. In this situation, you will need to use the cookies of your Safari browser to view and retrieve the history.

Cookies are small files that many websites use in order to store certain data. They contain data like URLs, etc. So, by finding and viewing cookies, you can see the sites that you have visited on your Safari browser.

Follow these instructions learn how to use cookies to retrieve lost browsing history on Safari:

Step 1: Launch Safari on your Mac. You can launch it from your Dock via the Launchpad menu.
Step 2: Once the Safari browser is opened, use the top-left corner of the screen to find and click on the Safari menu. Then, choose the Preferences option. It will open the settings menu for Safari.

how do you find deleted history on safari mac - Safari Preferences

Step 3: In the Preferences section, find and click on the Privacy tab. This is where cookies are saved. Once you are on the Privacy screen, click on the Manage Website Data option. This will show you a list of websites that you have accessed on Safari. Use it to retrieve your lost history on Safari.

recover safari history macbook/macbook pro/macbook air - Privacy Safari

Not all cookies store the same data. So, it is likely that you won’t be able to retrieve websites that you wish to find via this method. Apart from this, cookies can sometimes get corrupted. In such cases, it becomes impossible to retrieve your Safari history from them.

If you are looking for a way to recover deleted/lost Safari history on your iPhone, then you will be glad to know that it is possible thanks to professional iPhone data recovery tools. It is recommended that you use iMyFone D-Back iPhone data recovery tool for this purpose as it is easy to use and allows you to recover many types of deleted/lost data (including Safari history) thanks to its variety of recovery modes.

iMyFone D-Back is compatible with the latest iOS versions and it is suitable for beginners as all you need to do is use it’s simple 3-step process to recover your deleted data on Safari. iMyFone D-Back has a free trial version which you can use to see whether it satisfies your needs. Once you are fully satisfied, you can choose your desired plan to unlock all of its features.

iMyFone D-Back

Selectively recover 22+ file types including WhatsApp, Viber, WeChat, Kik, Line, photos, videos, messages, contacts, and notes.
Allows you to preview the recoverable data and recover them selectively.
Provides 5 recovery modes: Recover from iOS Device/iTunes Backup/iCloud Backup/Smart Recovery/Fix IOS System.
It supports the newest iPhone 14 Pro Max, iPhone 14 Pro, iPhone 14, iPhone XS Max, etc.

Try It Free Buy Now

There are several ways to recover cleared Safari history on Mac. Depending on the different scenarios, any of the above-listed methods can prove to be useful. So, it is recommended that you try these methods one-by-one until you have successfully recovered the browser history on Safari.

Of course, if you need to save time and recover Safari history on a Mac quickly, don't hesitate to try iMyFone D-Back . And if you are looking to recover deleted Safari history on your iPhone, it is also possible. Simply use the 3-step recovery process of iMyFone D-Back and selectively recover the files that you want.

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Home > PC Data Recovery > [2024] How to Recover Deleted/Lost Safari History on Mac/iPhone

How to Recover Deleted History on a Mac for Google Chrome or Safari

By Jeff Cochin
Updated on March 16, 2022

Table of Contents

Your browser history contains some important information regarding the websites you have visited. As you surf the web, your browser keeps track of sites you access and appends them to its history file. Of course, you can save sites you want to revisit with a bookmark, but sometimes we don’t realize we will want to return to a site and don’t bother. Then, if your history gets deleted, you are left scrambling trying to remember where you’d been. If you were engaged in any kind of serious research, this can be a big problem.

Recovering a Deleted Browser History

We are going to show you how to recover a deleted history on Mac for Google Chrome browsers. We will also show you how to recover your deleted history on Mac for Safari users. Here are some methods that may be able to help you recover a deleted browsing history on your Mac.

How to Recover Chrome and Safari History on a Mac with a Google or Safari Account

Let’s look at the built-in safety measures provided by Google and Apple through your accounts.

First, we will investigate recovering your Safari history with your Apple iCloud account. This procedure presumes that you are syncing the folders on your Mac with iCloud.

Open iCloud.com from your Safari web browser.

For Chrome users who have synced their bookmarks to a Google account, the following procedure can be used to restore them.

Start Chrome on your Mac or MacBook.

Click the three dots in the top-right corner of the browser and choose Settings .

Your bookmarks will be restored to your browser from your Google Account.

How to Restore Deleted Safari and Google Chrome History on a Mac with Software

Data recovery software can be used to recover a deleted browser history file. This can be extremely useful if you have lost or deleted your Chrome or Safari browser history. Use the following procedure to recover the lost items with Disk Drill data recovery software.

Launch Disk Drill and select the disk with the lost history file from the list presented in the app’s main window.

This procedure will only work if the files in question have not been overwritten. You can also recover a deleted Firefox history on Mac with this procedure, or virtually any other file that has been deleted but not overwritten.

Recover Deleted History from Google Chrome or Safari on a Mac Using Cookies

Here’s how to use Cookies to recover a deleted browser history. You can use the information contained in the cookie to find sites you have visited.

Click on Privacy and Security .

Click on the cookie to locate the website URL.

Launch Safari and click on the word Safari in the top-left corner.

How to Retrieve Deleted Safari and Chrome History on Mac by Restoring from Time Machine

If you use your Mac’s built-in backup and recovery tool Time Machine to make backups of your system, you should be able to use the app to retrieve a deleted Safari or Chrome browsing history. You will need the name of the file that stores the browsing history.

Safari stores its history in a file named history.db located in the /Users/<your name>/Library/Safari folder.

Chrome stores its history in the history.db file located in this folder: /Users/<your name>/Library/Application Support/Google/Chrome/Default .

With this information in hand, use the following procedure to restore the history files with Time Machine’s backup media.

Close Safari.

Scroll down and select the History.db file.

Search for a version of the History.db file that may hold your lost Safari browsing history.

Close your Chrome browser.
Open Finder and select Go -> Go to Folder .
Enter ~/Library/Application Support/Google/Chrome/Default and click the Go button.

Click the Time Machine icon located in the Menu Bar and select Enter Time Machine .
Search for a version of the History.db file that may hold your lost Chrome browsing history.
Click Restore to restore the selected file.

How to Check History on Safari and Google Chrome

You can easily view or check your history on these two popular web browsers using the following simple steps.

Open Safari.

Google Chrome

Launch Chrome.
Click the three dots in the top-right corner of the browser.

Tips for Successfully Recovering Lost History on a Mac

Here are a few tips that may be useful for recovering your lost browser history on a Mac.

💽 Back up your Mac using Time Machine. It’s a built-in backup and recovery tool that can be a lifesaver when disaster strikes. You should get into the habit of regularly backing up your Mac and its valuable data. The few minutes you spend backing up your Mac can save you from many frustrating hours down the road.
⏳ Attempt the recovery as soon as you discover the history has been lost. If you need to use data recovery software, it is essential to perform the recovery before the deleted file has been overwritten.
🔄 Sync your bookmarks using your Google Account or Apple’s iCloud for additional protection against accidentally deleted files.

Losing your browsing history can be a problem, but with the methods described above, you have a good chance of getting it back. The key is to act promptly before the lost files are overwritten by new data. Even a reliable tool like Disk Drill cannot recover lost files that have been overwritten by new information. We again stress the importance of regularly backing up your Mac as protection against losing history files or other important information from your computer.

How can I see deleted history on a Mac without Time Machine?

If you haven’t backed up your Mac with Time Machine, you can recover the deleted history using data recovery software. With data recovery software you can scan for a deleted history file and restore it to your Mac.

How can I recover deleted history on Safari?

You can recover a deleted history file on Safari by restoring it from a Time Machine backup. We refer you to the Time Machine recovery section of the main article for the specific steps you should follow.

How do I find deleted history for Safari on an iPhone?

Follow these steps to see the deleted Safari history on an iPhone. This will not work if you were surfing while using incognito mode.

Open Settings on your iPhone.
Locate Safari and tap on it to open the settings.
Click on the Advanced tab at the bottom of the screen.
Click Website Data in the next section to view some of the deleted Safari browser history.

How do I find my Safari history on a Mac?

Here’s how to find your Safari history on Mac. Use these steps to look at and search your Safari history:

Open Safari and click on the History tab.
Click on Show All History to display your complete Safari browsing history.
View the history by scrolling through it or use the search bar to look for a specific item.

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5 Ways to View & Recover Deleted Safari History on iPhone/iPad

“Is it possible to recover deleted Safari history on iPhone? I want to retrieve deleted history from around 3 months earlier.”

Safari is the default browser for iOS devices and Mac computers, which is widely used among Apple users. While searching the internet with Safari, it usually keeps the browsing history and bookmarks for picking up what has been read.

What if you have accidentally deleted your browsing history, or it is suddenly gone without a record? Don't worry. You still have a chance to get back the deleted Safari history. Keep reading to find out how to recover deleted Safari history on iPhone with or without backup.

Can Safari History Be Recovered Once It Is Deleted?

Yes, you can recover deleted browsing history from Safari, but it's not guaranteed. When you clear your browsing history in Safari, it's not permanently erased from your iPhone or iPad. Instead, it's temporarily stored in a different part of your device's memory for a limited period. This storage period typically lasts around one month for iPhone/iPad and up to one year for Mac. If you act quickly, you sitll have a good chance to recover deleted Safari history.

Check iPhone Settings for Deleted Safari History

Before you try any other methods listed below, first check your iPhone itself. The simplest way of recovering your browsing history is to find them in Safari Website Data under Settings. Here's how to do it:

On your iPhone, open the Settings app. Scroll down to find Safari and tap on it.
On the next screen, scroll to the bottom and tap on the Advanced option.
Now choose the Website Data and you'll view the domain of the deleted browsing history.

find deleted safari history on iphone ipad

The drawback of this method:

This method will only show you the root domain of your visited sites. You won't be able to find a specific page you've viewed before. Also, this method only works as long as you don't clear cookies and history from Safari.

Recover Safari History on iPhone without Backup (Recommend)

If there is no backup of your deleted Safari history, FoneGeek iPhone Data Recovery is highly recommended to you. As the world's 1st iPhone and iPad data recovery software, it has helped tens of thousands of iOS users find deleted or lost data. What makes it so popular? The answer is its reliability and function:

Offers 3 recovery modes, and you can choose the one that best fits your needs to recover deleted Safari history.
Preview the deleted Safari history for free before the recovery process and selectively recover only the browsing history you need.
Supports to recover many other types of data like messages, contacts, photos , videos, notes , WhatsApp messages, Viber, etc.
Works well on all iPhone models and iOS versions, even the latest iPhone 15/14 and iOS 17/16.

Follow the steps below to recover deleted safari history on your iPhone without backup:

Step 1. Connect iPhone to Computer

To start with, install the program on your Windows PC or Mac and launch it. Choose Recover Data from iOS Devices and then connect your iPhone to the computer using a USB cable.

Step 2. Select Safari History to Scan

Once the program detects your iPhone, choose Safari History or any other type of files you would like to recover, and then click Scan to begin scanning.

Step 3. Recover Deleted Safari History

After the scan, click Safari History from the category list to preview the recoverable Safari history. Then select the ones you need and click the Recover to PC button to save the deleted Safari history to your computer.

recover iphone safari history without backup

Recover Deleted Safari History on iPhone from Backup

Option 1. recover safari history from icloud web.

You are allowed to recover only Safari history from iCloud's official site as long as you have turned on iCloud Auto Syncing on your iPhone. Follow these simple steps:

Sign in to the iCloud official site from any browser using your iCloud account.
Navigate to the Advanced option and scroll down to click Restore Bookmarks .
Choose an archive of bookmarks you want and click on Restore .

Only the deleted Safari history within the last 30 days can be retrieved. Also, the existing Safari bookmarks on your iPhone will be replaced and erased, which might cause new data loss.

Option 2. Restore iPhone Safari History from iCloud Backup

If you have backed up your iPhone to iCloud, restoring your iPhone from the iCloud backup is also one of the feasible choices you can try. Doing this will get back all the app data, including the deleted Safari history. But you need to factory reset the iPhone before performing the restore.

Open Settings and click on General , scroll down to tap on " Transfer or Reset iPhone and select Erase All Content and Settings .
Follow the instructions to set up your iPhone until you reach the page of Apps & Data . Then, choose Restore from iCloud Backup .
Sign in to iCloud and choose a backup to restore the device. All data in the backup file, including the deleted Safari history, will come back.

You're not allowed to preview the deleted files and selectively recover what you need only. What's worse, all the existing data on your iPhone will be erased and you'll lose your latest data that are not included in the iCloud backup.

Selectively Recover Deleted Safari History on iPhone from iCloud Backup

With FoneGeek iPhone Data Recovery, you're able to preview and selectively recover deleted Safari history from iCloud backup.

Run FoneGeek iPhone Data Recovery and switch to Recover Data from iCloud .
Sign in to iCloud with your Apple ID and password. Then select the data types you want to restore and click on Scan .
After you've downloaded the iCloud data, preview and select the data you need, then click on Recover to PC .

Option 3. Recover Deleted Safari History from iTunes Backup

If you have made an iTunes/Finder backup before you deleted the Safari history, you can also recover the deleted browsing history by restoring your iPhone from the backup. However, to restore the backed-up data, you will have to erase the existing data on your iPhone.

Connect your iPhone to your computer and launch iTunes or Finder.
Click on the iPhone icon when it shows up, and then choose Restore Backup .
Select the backup file that contains your deleted Safari history and click on Restore .

Same as iCloud, preview and selective recovery are not supported. Restoring from iTunes backup might also lead to data loss as any new files added to your iPhone since the backup will be replaced and overwritten.

Selectively Recover Deleted Safari History on iPhone from iTunes Backup

Again, we recommend you use FoneGeek iPhone Data Recovery to recover deleted Safari history from iTunes backup without erasing any data.

Launch FoneGeek iPhone Data Recovery and choose the option of Recover Data from iTunes Backup .
Select the iTunes backup file you want and click Next . Then select Safari History and click on Scan .
After the scan, you can preview the Safari history and selectively recover those you need by clicking on Recover .

FAQs about iPhone Safari History Recovery

Q1. How long does Safari keep your browsing history?

This question has confused a lot of iPhone users. Actually, there is a definite answer to this question: your Mac can keep your browsing history for as long as a year, while iPhone and iPad keep browsing history for a month. This is what is demonstrated on Apple’s official site.

Q2. How to recover deleted Safari history on an iPad?

There are different methods for recovering deleted Safari history on your iPhone, most of which apply to iPads. You can try using FoneGeek iPhone Data Recovery, which is compatible with major iOS devices, including iPhone, iPad, and iPod touch.

Q3. Where is Safari history stored on your Mac?

All the Safari history you can see on your Mac is stored in the ~/Library/Safari/ folder.

Just click on Finder > Go > Go to Folder .
Then, enter the path in the textbox and click on OK to open the History.db file.

Q4. How to avoid losing Safari history?

To avoid the possible loss of Safari history, you can enable Safari in iCloud preferences. In this way, the Safari data will be backed up to the cloud automatically.

Besides that, you can also use some tools such as FoneGeek iOS Backup & Restore to back up iPhone data to your computer selectively or fully.

This article has outlined all feasible solutions to recover deleted Safari history on your iPhone. You can pick the one that works best for you. We strongly recommend FoneGeek iPhone Data Recovery for its easy-to-use interface and ablility to recover Safari history with or without backup.

Joan J. Mims is interested in researching all tips about iPhone, iPad and Android. He loves to share useful ideas with all users.

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Table of Content

1 Can Safari History Be Recovered Once It Is Deleted?
2 Check iPhone Settings for Deleted Safari History
3 Recover Safari History on iPhone without Backup (Recommend) Hot
4 Recover Deleted Safari History on iPhone from Backup
5 FAQs about iPhone Safari History Recovery
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Safari User Guide

Change your homepage
Import bookmarks, history, and passwords
Make Safari your default web browser
Go to websites
Find what you’re looking for
Bookmark webpages that you want to revisit
See your favorite websites
Use tabs for webpages
Pin frequently visited websites
Play web videos
Mute audio in tabs
Pay with Apple Pay
Autofill credit card info
Autofill contact info
Keep a Reading List
Hide ads when reading articles
Translate a webpage
Download items from the web
Share or post webpages
Add passes to Wallet
Save part or all of a webpage
Print or create a PDF of a webpage
Customize a start page
Customize the Safari window
Customize settings per website
Zoom in on webpages
Get extensions
Manage cookies and website data
Block pop-ups
Clear your browsing history
Browse privately
Autofill user name and password info
Prevent cross-site tracking
View a Privacy Report
Change Safari preferences
Keyboard and other shortcuts
Troubleshooting

Clear your browsing history in Safari on Mac

You can remove all records that Safari keeps of where you’ve browsed during a period of time you choose. If your Mac and your other devices have Safari turned on in iCloud preferences , your browsing history is removed from all of them. Clearing your browsing history in Safari doesn’t clear any browsing histories kept independently by websites you visited.

Open Safari for me

Choose how far back you want your browsing history cleared.

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

History of webpages you visited

The back and forward list for open webpages

Frequently visited site list

Recent searches

Icons for webpages

Snapshots saved for open webpages

List of items you downloaded (downloaded files aren’t removed)

Websites added for Quick Website Search

Websites that asked to use your location

Websites that asked to send you notifications

Need to Kill Some Time? Here Are 6 Easy Ways to Free Up Storage Space on Your iPhone

[table-of-contents] stripped

When everything about your iPhone works normally, it becomes an extension of yourself. But the second you try to download an app, only to be met with the dreaded “iPhone Storage Full” pop-up, panic can start to set in. Before you go on a full-on deleting spree, here's how to free up storage space on your iPhone without regretting your decisions later.

The first step is to see what exactly is taking up all the space on your iPhone. Go to Settings > General > iPhone Storage , and you'll see a color-coded indicator bar at the top of the screen. This shows you at a glance how much space your apps, photos, messages, and other media are occupying. Beneath this bar are all your apps, listed in descending order from the biggest space hog to the smallest.

Here's how to free up space on your iPhone before it becomes something you have to do.

Move photos and videos to external storage

There's a good chance that your Photos app is at the very top of the storage-usage list. One effective, if painstaking approach to freeing up iPhone storage is simply going through the Photos app and deleting old pictures and videos that you're sure you won't miss.

Alternatively, you can move all your photos and videos to an external storage location, which allows you to delete the locally stored media and start fresh if you so choose. You can sign up for a digital, cloud-based service (such as Dropbox , Google Photos , or Microsoft OneDrive ) and export your photos there. Just keep in mind that while it may be free to sign up for and use these services initially, you may need to upgrade to a paid subscription if your amount of media exceeds their free-tier limitations.

If you want to keep your media offline, you could also connect to an external hard drive via USB-to-Lightning cable and export your media that way.

Enable iCloud for photos

Apple devices frequently prompt users to enable iCloud for the best experience — the reason it does this is because iCloud allows you to access your data from all your Apple devices. It's how you can sync the photos from your iPhone to your iPad , for example.

Another feature is that enabling iCloud will automatically keep the high-resolution version of your photos and videos in cloud storage until you want to download them, while the low-res (and also low-storage) versions are stored locally on the device, saving you a bit of space.

To enable iCloud, tap Settings > Your Apple ID Name > iCloud Drive , then toggle on Sync This iPhone .

Note that while iCloud is a type of cloud storage service, it will not recover photos that have been deleted from your device — in other words, when you delete a picture on your iPhone, you also delete it from iCloud.

Delete or offload apps you don't use

Once you've scanned the list of apps on your iPhone that are taking up the most space, you may notice a few lesser-used apps that you can part with right away. Tap on an app you'd like to remove and either select “Delete app” or “Offload app.”

Deleting the app will remove the app's storage and data from your phone. Offloading the app, however, frees up storage space but retains the data, so you won't lose all your information in case you want to redownload it again.

If you have a habit of downloading apps only to use them once and never again, you can set your iPhone to automatically offload unused apps for you. To enable this, go to Settings > App Store , then toggle on Offload Unused Apps .

Set up auto-delete for your messages

Depending on how sentimental you are or often you scroll back in your text history, you may want to consider auto-deleting your Messages since a years-long backlog could be taking up more iPhone memory than necessary (especially if there are lots of videos, photos, and GIFs shared between you and your group chat).

To set this up, go to Settings > Messages > Keep Messages , then choose the length of time you want to keep all your messages going forward. The default is set to “Forever,” but you can change it to “30 days” or “1 year” — any messages older than that length of time will be automatically deleted.

Streamline your downloads

You may notice a significant portion of the iPhone Storage indicator bar taken up by downloaded media such as music, movies, podcasts, e-books, and audiobooks. The good news is that you can make changes from your Settings without having to open each app and remove downloads manually.

Tap on each of the corresponding apps in your iPhone Storage list to review whether or not you need all of that media downloaded. Underneath the “Delete app” and “Offload app” options for these apps, you should see the downloaded media that's on your device, along with an icon to delete next to each one.

Clear your browsing history

Finally, if you can't remember the last time you cleared your smartphone browsers, now is a good time to do that — it's a quick and easy way to help free up a bit of memory.

To clear your Safari history, go to Settings > Safari > Clear History and Website Data , then choose the timeframe to wipe: last hour, today, today and yesterday, or all history.

To clear your Google Chrome history, open the app, tap the three dots in the bottom right-hand corner of the screen, and choose “Clear Browsing Data.” You'll be able to select or deselect whether to clear your browsing history, cookies, site data, cached images and files, autofill data, or saved passwords. Then, tap “Clear Browsing Data” at the bottom of the screen.

Knowing how to free up storage space on your iPhone will allow you to download media and take pictures without worrying about running out of memory.

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How to recover deleted history on my apple iPad

Unable to recover my history which has been deleted accidentaly

iPad Pro, iPadOS 17

Posted on Apr 1, 2024 4:09 AM

recover deleted history safari mac

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3 Simple Ways to Recover Deleted Safari History on Mac

What Is Safari History and How to Find It?

How Can Safari History Be Deleted and When It Can Be Recovered?

How to Perform Safari History Recovery?

Method 1: Use Disk Drill

Method 2: Restore from iCloud backup

Method 3: Restore from Time Machine backup

How to Prevent Safari History Loss?

How can I recover deleted Safari tabs on iPhone?

How do I recover deleted Safari history on iPad?

How to recover deleted Google Chrome history on iPhone?

Tips & Tricks

How to Recover Deleted Safari History on a Mac, the Easy Way

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iPhone / iPad

How to Recover Deleted Safari Browsing History on Mac?

What is Safari history?

How to find and open Safari history on Mac?

Find history in Safari:

View the History.db file in Finder:

How to recover deleted Safari history on Mac?

Method 1: Recover deleted Safari history with data recovery software

Method 2: Recover deleted history on Mac Safari with TimeMachine backup

Method 3: Recover MacBook deleted Safari history with iCloud

How to Find Deleted History on Mac and iOS Device (Safari)

Part I. How to Find Deleted Safari History on Mac without Time Machine

Hot Articles

Mac File Recovery

How to Recover Deleted History on Mac Google Chrome or Safari

Can browsing history be recovered once it is deleted?

Method 1. Recover Deleted Chrome History with Google My Activity

Method 4: How to Recover Deleted Internet History from Time Machine Backup

Method 5: How to Recover Deleted History on Chrome or Safari Easily

I: Recoverit Makes Browser History Recovery Easier

II: Steps on How to Recover Chrome or Safari History on Mac

Step 1 Select the Mac hard drive with browser data

Step 2 Scan the browser hard drive

Step 3 Recover deleted history on Mac

Bonus 1: How to Find and Check History on Mac

I: How to Check History on Safari

II: How to View History on Chrome

Bonus 2: Tips for Browser History Recovery on Mac

What's Wrong with Mac

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Table of Contents

Cisdem Data Recovery for Mac

How to recover deleted Safari history on Mac?

#1 Recover deleted Safari history on Mac with Time Machine

How to recover deleted Safari history on Mac with Time Machine?

#2 Recover deleted Safari history on Mac without Time Machine

Option 1: Restore deleted Safari history using software

How to find deleted Safari history on Mac without Time Machine?

Option 2. Find deleted history on Safari by cookies

Option 3. Retrieve deleted Safari history from iCloud Sync

How to recover deleted Safari history on iPhone/iPad?

#1 Recover deleted Safari history on iPhone/iPad without backup

Option 1. Recover with iOS data recovery tool

How to recover deleted Safari history on iPhone without backup?

Option 2. Recover in Safari app

Option 3. Recover from iPhone Settings

#2 Recover deleted Safari history on iPhone/iPad with backup

Option 1. Access deleted Safari history without computer