Member Avatar for sasha

Whenever you enter the first letter of someplace you'd like to go in the Safari search window a dropdown list of places you've already been to pops up. Some sites I wish were not there. Is there anyway to turn this feature off.

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Short answer: the Smart Search/address field pulls suggestions from Safari’s History, your Bookmarks/Favorites (and Top Sites/frequently visited), plus pages open on other devices when Safari is using iCloud — there isn’t a single “turn off all address autocomplete” checkbox that covers every source. Since asked, here are practical, safe steps that address the different sources (and a quick note on the replies from and ). (support.apple.com)

To remove one offending entry without nuking everything, open Safari > History > Show All History, search for the site, select it and press Delete (or right‑click and Remove). If the suggestion comes from a bookmark, open the Bookmarks sidebar or choose Bookmarks > Edit Bookmarks and delete the bookmark. Those two actions remove specific dropdown entries. (Deleting prefs, as suggested, is generally unnecessary for this.) (macobserver.com)

If you want a full reset, use History > Clear History and Website Data and pick how far back to clear — note this also removes Top Sites/frequently visited lists, cookies and site data and can sign you out of sites. If Safari is enabled in iCloud, clears will propagate to your other Apple devices, so clear history there or disable Safari in iCloud if items keep coming back. (As noticed, clearing one place doesn’t help if the same item exists elsewhere.) (help.apple.com)

To avoid future entries: use Private Browsing (File > New Private Window) so sessions aren’t saved, or reduce suggestions via Safari > Settings > Search — uncheck “Include Safari Suggestions” and/or “Include search engine suggestions.” Those settings plus using Private Windows give the best control without digging through preference files. (support.apple.com)

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Member Avatar for Dani

I searched around the preferences menus and don't think this is possible. Safari keeps a listing of your history. If you don't want anyone else who uses your computer to know you've been somewhere, don't go there in the first place. Sorry, not a solution, but it is an answer :(

Member Avatar for Tekmaven

I'm not a Mac guy, but whenever I've had a problem on mac's, the solution has always been to delete the app's preference file. I'm sure thats similar to the solution here ;-).

Member Avatar for Dani

While replying to your message before, I tried deleting my history in my preferences and the dropdown still didn't go away. However, when I delete the history in my Windows Internet Explorer the dropdown clears itself at the same time. Have you tried IE for the Mac yet?

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