Locating a specific item in browsing history can feel like finding a needle in the haystack, especially if you’re on the go.
Yes, I could just tap Safari’s back button multiple times or swipe to go back a single webpage at a time until I found the webpage I was looking for, but that’s a time-consuming process which unnecessarily wastes my iPhone’s cellular data.
As you’ll discover in this tutorial, Safari provides a very handy, though not immediately obvious shortcut which allows you to quickly jump to any previously visited webpage.
Viewing recent Safari history on iPhone and iPad
1) Launch Safari on your iOS device.2) Tap and hold Safari’s back arrow button at the bottom left.
This will bring up a menu with the history list of webpages you viewed recently.
Tip: Long-tapping Safari’s forward arrow button will also pull up the history list provided you jumped back to a recently visited webpage beforehand.
Keep in mind that the webpages you see in the list represent only that specific tab’s history. Since you’re unlikely to visit hundreds of webpages through a single Safari tab, your tab-specific history won’t be too long, making it easier to visually spot a recently visited webpage in the list.
If you want to access a history for another Safari tab, first switch to that tab and then long-tap the back/forward button. This feature works in desktop Safari on the Mac, too.
Tell us what you think and share some Safari tips of your own in the comments.
Other Safari tutorials
As we’ve written before, with Safari for iOS and OS X you can also:Check out our complete tutorials archive.
