How to delete search history

How to Delete Search History

Deleting search history is a digital security step you can take today to claim your online freedom. Remember that your browser records everything: how many times you visited a particular website, which products you searched for and which ones you also added to the cart, how you translated a page from Spanish to English and the login credentials you used to access your banking platform. Browsers also allow websites to store cookies and use the patterns of your online behavior to form your unique digital fingerprint, then process your data to send you personalized advertisements. If you do not want your browser to affect your online privacy, security and freedom, read this guide till the end and find out how you can delete the search history on popular browsers and streaming platforms.

How to Delete Search History in Google Chrome

Windows PC

  1. Open Google Chrome menu by clicking the three-dotted icon present on the top right corner of the screen.
  2. Click History. Find ‘History’ at the top of the drop-down menu. You can also use keyboard shortcut Ctrl+H. Your browser will open a new tab providing a list of recently opened pages.
  3. Checkmark boxes one by one if you would like to select and delete particular pages.

Use this 3-step method to clear all the browsing data at once.

  1. Open Google Chrome menu.
  2. Select ‘More Tools’ then click ‘Clear Browsing Data’ in the drop-down menu. A checklist will appear.
  3. To clear everything, select Clear Data. You can also choose a custom date range, and decide if you would like to keep cached files and cookies data.

Android Devices

Follow this method to clear Chrome’s browsing history from Android mobile phones and tablets.

  1. At the top right, click the dotted settings icon.
  2. Tap ‘History’ and you will find a list of recently opened pages.
  3. Long press the particular pages you would like to delete. Or, tap ‘Clear Browsing Data’.
  4. You will find ‘All-time’ in the Time range and notice that three boxes are check-marked. These are the default options. You can uncheck any data you don’t want to remove from the browsing history.
  5. Tap ‘Clear Data’.

Mac

Though Apple Safari is the most popular web browser for Mac devices, some users choose to surf the web through Google Chrome because of its usability features. You can follow this method, similar to the previous one, to clear search history.

  1. Open Chrome and click ‘More’ at the top right corner.
  2. Click History 
  3. Click on Clear Browsing Data on the left. A box will appear.
  4. You can select from the drop-down menu the history you want to delete.
  5. To clear everything, select All, or, checkmark the boxes you want Chrome to clear.
  6. Click Clear Data.

iOS devices

  1. Open Chrome app on your iOS device.
  2. Tap More at the bottom right. Open History.
  3. Navigate to the bottom and tap ‘Clear Browsing Data’. You may also uncheck items you do not want to remove.
  4. Tap ‘Clear Browsing Data’. At the top right, tap Done.

Google Chrome has an excellent privacy feature called ‘Incognito Mode’. It is a highly-recommended private window which when enabled, does not log browsing history, cookies, and other types of site data. Though Google Chrome is not 100% secure (read its review) without a VPN running in the background, its private window can still hide online activities and block websites from storing malicious cookies on the device.

How to Delete Search History from Mozilla Firefox

Windows PC and Mac

  1. Click the Library tab III\.
  2. Select History, then click Clear Recent History.
  3. Select how much history you want to delete. You can choose a time range from the drop-down menu and check mark the particular data you want to delete.
  4. Click the OK button. This will close the window and your selected items will be deleted from your history.

Android and iOS Devices

  1. Tap the Menu button on the bottom right corner and select History.
  2. If you want to clear the entire data, tap ‘Delete History’.
  3. If you want to delete selected pages, long-press any page from the list, then open the menu and tap ‘delete’.
  4.  Tap Delete Browsing data.

Similar to Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox also has a Private Window feature which does not log a user’s online activity of that particular session.

How to Delete Search History from Apple Safari

Mac Devices

  1. Open Safari browser. You will find the Safari icon next to the Apple icon.
  2. In the drop-down menu, click Clear History.
  3. Choose the timeframe from the drop-down menu. Click Clear History. As per the dialogue box, this also clears your cookies and cache along with your Safari history.

iOS devices

  1. Open phone settings and swipe right.
  2. Tap Safari and scroll down the settings menu.
  3. Tap ‘Clear History and Website Data’. The button will turn grey indicating that browsing history is clear.

How to Delete Search History from Opera

Windows PC and Mac

  1. Open Opera browser and press Ctrl+H / Command + H in Mac to open your history page.
  2. Click Clear browsing data on the top-right corner.
  3. Select the data and the time range.
  4. Click Clear Data. 

Android Devices

  1. Open the Opera browsers. Tap the Settings button in the upper-right corner of the browser window.
  2. Tap Clear Browsing Data.  
  3. On the Clear browsing data dialogue box, check the boxes for the data you want to delete.
  4. Tap OK. Data Cleared message will appear indicating your search history is clear.

iOS devices

  1. Open Opera Touch app.
  2. Choose History from the menu.
  3. Select a time range or choose the beginning of time if you want to delete everything.
  4. Check the boxes next to the types of data you would like to delete.
  5. Click Clear Browsing Data.

How to Delete Search History from Microsoft Edge

Windows PC and Mac

  1. Open Microsoft Edge. On the top right corner, open the menu.
  2. From the drop-down menu, select History, then click ‘Clear Browsing Data’.
  3. A checklist will appear asking for the time range and types of data you would like to delete. Checkmark the relevant boxes.
  4. Click ‘Clear Now’.  

Android Devices

  1. Open Microsoft Edge on Android.
  2. Tap on Menu, then select Settings.
  3. Scroll down to Privacy and Security tab.
  4. Select Clear Browsing Data and enable the checkbox for browser history.
  5. Tap on Clear to delete the history.

iOS Devices

  1. Open the Edge iOS app.
  2. Tap on the menu icon at the bottom right of the screen.
  3. Tap ‘Settings’ then tap ‘Privacy’.
  4. In the privacy menu, tap ‘clear browsing data’.
  5. Checkmark the types of data you wish to delete. Then tap ‘Clear Browsing Data’ in red.
  6. A confirmation box will appear. Click ‘Clear’ and your browser history will be deleted.

The Search History on Netflix

Why should you remove viewing activity from Netflix?

Users can choose to hide/delete the streaming history on Netflix if:

  • they don’t want their watched movies, episodes or series to appear in the viewing activity.
  • they don’t want Netflix to make future recommendations based on your viewing activity.

How to Delete Viewing Activity from Netflix

  1. Open Netflix website in a web browser.
  2. Open the Profile section on the top right corner.
  3. Click ‘Account’.
  4. In Profile and Parental Controls, select the particular profile you wish to delete search history from.
  5. Scroll down to viewing activity and click ‘View’ in blue color.
  6. Either use the ‘Hide All’ button or delete particular episodes by clicking the marked circle on the right side of the screen. To hide all the episodes of that series, click ‘Hide Series’.

Note that Netflix may take up to 24 hours to hide an episode, series or entire viewing activity.

How to Delete Watch History on Youtube

Windows and Mac

  1. Open the Youtube website. Navigate to the menu on the left side.
  2. Click ‘History’.
  3. If you want to select particular items to delete, click ‘Manage All History’ in the sidebar. Here, you can choose to clear history based on a custom time range.
  4. You can choose to delete the entire watch history by clicking ‘Clear All Watch History’.

Android and iOS Devices

  1. Open the Youtube app on your mobile phone.
  2. Tap on the account icon, then tap on the settings section.
  3. Open History and Privacy menu.
  4. Click Clear Search History or Clear Watch History.

Bonus Security Tips from Digital Experts

Deleting search history does not guarantee 100% safety. 

Clearing browsing history is highly advisable; however, there are other advanced methods that you can use to ensure device-level, as well as network-level security.

  1. Use Incognito Mode or Private Window to surf the internet. All popular browsers have this security feature on their menu. You will not have to check and delete your browsing history anymore if you habitually browse through private windows.
  2. Manage internet cookies, whether or not you delete your browsing history. Cookies can damage your device and sometimes allow unauthorized access to your device.
  3. Use a secure browser that encrypts search queries, does not have an ad program and blocks malware and advertisements.
  4. Download iProVPN and protect your online identity with military-grade encryption features.
  5. Use a strong ‘Network Security Key’ to encrypt online traffic exchanged between the web and your devices.

Internet privacy and security is everyone’s right. IProVPN has crafted this detailed guide so that users can conveniently hide their browsing activities and protect their online identity. Our team is on a mission to provide a safe browsing experience to all users regardless of their location. With iProVPN by your side, claim your digital freedom and surf the way you want to!


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