How To Clear My Iphone Search History

Home > Erase iPhone > Why Can't I Clear My History on Safari ? Reasons been Revealed!

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Tata Davis

September 13, 2018 (Updated: November 30, 2021)

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Is Safari not clearing history on your iPhone or iPad? Is the "Clear History and Website Data" button greyed out so that you can't delete Safari history? All these phenomenons make you are wondering that why can't I clear my history on Safari 2020. Now, this guide will show you the reasons and how to do it.

clear history and website data button grayed out on iphone

Part 1: Why Can't I Clear My History on Safari?
Part 2. 5 Tips May Help You to Fix the Website Data on iPhone Not Deleting Issue
Part 2: A Thorough Way to Clear iPhone Safari History, Caches and Cookies - Worth A Try

Part 1. Why Can't I Clear My History on Safari?

After the investigation of the user's issues, we found that the most likely reason of why Can I clear my dearch history is that the "Clear history and data button" greyed out.

What would cause Clear History And Website Data greyed out?

When there's no history or website data to clear, the setting turns grey. The setting might also be grey if you have web content restrictions set up under Content & Privacy Restrictions in Screen Time.

Many users block certain websites in Safari by enabling the "Restrictions" tab under "General" in the "Settings" app. The most likely option that may have been clicked within the "Restrictions" is the "Limit Adult Content" option, which means to keep children from being able to gain access to inexpedient content online. This is why the "Clear History and Website Data" option is greyed out. This may be the main cause for 90% to 95% users.

Easy Way to Slove can't Clear Safari Data

Part 2. 5 Tips May Help You to Fix the Website Data on iPhone Not Deleting Issue

For the said issue, the possible reason may be iPhone's restriction. Here you can check the solution 1 to troubleshoot this issue. But not everyone can solve it through the above solution. We will also provide other 4 small tips for you to solve the problem. Keep going!

#1. Steps on How to Clear Safari History on iPad/iPhone with Restrictions

Step 1: Launch the Settings app and go to General.
Step 2: Scroll down to the second option and tap on Restrictions.
Step 3: Type in your Restrictions passcode.
Step 4: Under the Allowed Content section, scroll down to Websites and tap on that.
Step 5: Within the Websites section you'll find three tabs namely All Websites, Limit Adult Content and Specific Websites Only. You must have selected either Limit Adult Content or Specific Websites Only. Deselect whichever of these two you had previously selected, and select All Websites as your current option.
Step 6: You can now go back to the Safari app under Settings list, and you will see that the Clear History and Website Data option is no longer greyed out.

Now you can tap on this function, and it will clear your Safari history on your iPhone or iPad. But one thing you should be noted that this way cannot wipe the Safari histories and related data permanently. They can be retrieved from iCloud or any other third party recovering tools.

#2. Stop syncing Safari over iCloud

If you still can't delete your Safari history, then it's time to look at your iCloud sync settings. If you use iCloud, it syncs your bookmarks, reading list, and browsing history across all your Apple devices. It shouldn't cause any problems, but iCloud sync occasionally leads to items reappearing in your iPhone or iPad browsing history.

Go to: Settings > Apple ID Profile > iCloud > Toggle Safari Off.
If Safari has already been toggled off, then turn on > click merge > turn off again.
Perform same for all iCloud connected devices. (On your Mac, go to System Preferences > iCloud > Until Safari.)
Now erase Safari history for each device.

icloud safari

#3. Block cookies for Safari on iOS 13 or before

Deleting Safari history does not clear data stored by cookies like login information, site ID and passwords. If you want to limit or block cookies:

Go to Settings > Safari > Block Cookies.
Choose Always Block or Allow From Current Website Only.

Block Cookies

#4. Hard reset your iPhone

It may happen that none of these steps work. We recommend doing a hard reset of your phone. How to do it?

On iPhone 8/8 Plus to iPhone 11 Pro : Press and quickly release Volume Up button and then Volume Down button. Then hold the Side button until "Slide to power off" option appears, and then shut down the device .

Force restart iPhone X

On iPhone 7/7 Plus: Hold the Side and Volume Down buttons at the same time until you see the Apple logo.

Force restart iPhone 7

On iPhone 6s and Earlier: Hold the Home and Top (or Side) buttons at the same time until you see the Apple logo.

Force restart iPhone 6

#5. Reset Network Settings and Reset All Settings to fix the issue

If a hard reset of your iPhone can still not solve the problem, then you should try to reset network settings and reset all settings on yur device. Here are the steps:

Go to Settings > General > Reset > Reset Network Settings.
Or go to Settings > General > Reset > Reset All Settings.

reset settings

Breif summary: By here, I hope you have already solved the "Clear History And Website Data" button greyed issue. Just because of this problem, I think it would be better to choose a simpler and more thorough way to clear Safari data. This will be introduced on the nest part.

Part 3. A Thorough Way to Clear iPhone Safari History, Caches and Cookies

Want a really clean sweep? You may don't want other people to know the Safari browsing history on your device and need to do a 100% unrecoverable sweep of it. Then you have the need to with the help of some third-party iPhone data erasers.

The tool named iMyFone Umate Pro iPhone Data Eraser can realize the aim well. There's not the slightest chance of data recovery. The tool is reputed to be the safest iOS data eraser, world over.

8,000,000+ Downloads

Benefit A Lot from Umate Pro:

Completely erase Safari cache, history, cookies from iPhone, leaving no chance of recovery.
Previews and selection are available before erasing.
Previously deleted Safari history which are still recoverable will be fully wiped.
Erase private messages, photos, videos, notes, call logs, WhatsApp, Line, Viber, Kik, etc.
Advantages: 100% privacy security, easy to use, quick to run.

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Download Umate Pro to ClearSafari History Permanently

With just one click, you can erase your Safari cache and even your deleted Safari history which is still lurking around in your phone well after clearing history. You can also delete cookies and history of private files.

Step 1: Open Umate Pro iPhone Data Eraser and connect iPhone.

Step 2: Choose a erasing mode. If you want to clear existing Safari history, choose "Erase Private Data"; If you want to wipe deleted Safari data, select "Erase Deleted Files". Then just click "Scan".

Umate Pro

Step 3: After scanning, you can preview and select the Safari cache, history or cookies. Click "Erase Now" to proceed.

Umate Pro

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See, it's so easy! Umate Pro is free to scan and preview. You can try it free to enjoy those fantastic iPhone erasing features now!

Conclusion

There always are some user will encounter the issue that "Clear history and website data" button not working. Actually, there is no need to work so hard to clear Safari history on iPhone. iMyFone Umate Pro can permanently delete all the iPhone Safari histories and cache files with just one click!

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