Seven Safari Tips and Tricks for iPhone and iPad

Safari on iOS has a surprising number of hidden tricks, letting you manipulate tabs, conduct page-specific searches, and more, and not all of these features are immediately obvious due to the gestures involved.

We've rounded up some useful must-know Safari tips that you might not be aware of or may have forgotten, so make sure to check out our video because we bet there's something here that's going to be new to you.

Safari Tips and Tricks

  • Close All Tabs - Have hundreds of tabs open in Safari on your iPhone? You can close them all at once. Just long press right on the "Done" button in the tab view (which you can get to by pressing the little icon that looks like two squares) and you'll see an option to close all tabs.
  • Open Recently Closed Tabs - Accidentally closed a tab you didn't want to close? In the tab view, long press on the "+" button and it will bring up a list of tabs that you've closed recently so you can open it right back up.
  • Search Your Open Tabs - With tons of tabs, you might need to do some hunting around to find the specific tab you're looking for, but luckily, a built-in tab search feature makes this easier. Just scroll to the top of your tabs view (or tap the top of the screen to jump to the top) and you'll see a search bar for searching tabs.
  • Close Filtered Tabs - If you want to close some of your tabs while leaving the rest open, the search feature doubles as a filter. After doing a search in your tabs, long press on the "Cancel" button next to the search interface and you'll see an option to close only the tabs that match your search.
  • Find Text on Page - You know how you can use the Command + F feature on a Mac to find something specific on a page? There's a find feature in iOS too. With a website open, type in a search phrase in the search bar at the top and then scroll down to "On This Page" to search for that term on the website. Alternatively, you can open up the Share Sheet and locate the "Find on Page" button.
  • Close Tabs on Other Devices - If you have multiple devices and use iCloud along with the feature that syncs Safari information, you can close tabs on your Mac or your iPad right from your ‌iPhone‌. To do it, open up the tab view (again, the little icon with two squares), scroll all the way to the bottom of your open tabs, and then you'll see an interface that lists open tabs on other devices.
  • Handoff Websites - If you're looking at a website on your ‌iPhone‌ and then want to open it up on your Mac, you can use Handoff, which is available on most modern Mac machines and iPhones. On the Mac, you'll see a little Safari icon on your dock with a small ‌iPhone‌ icon, just click on that and whatever you're looking at on your ‌iPhone‌ can be opened up right on your Mac. You can also open websites from device to device using the same cloud tab interface used for closing tabs on other devices.

Have other useful Safari tips that we didn't share here? Let us know in the comments and we may include them in a future tips and tricks video.

Popular Stories

iphone 16 display

iPhone 17's Scratch Resistant Anti-Reflective Display Coating Canceled

Monday April 28, 2025 12:48 pm PDT by
Apple may have canceled the super scratch resistant anti-reflective display coating that it planned to use for the iPhone 17 Pro models, according to a source with reliable information that spoke to MacRumors. Last spring, Weibo leaker Instant Digital suggested Apple was working on a new anti-reflective display layer that was more scratch resistant than the Ceramic Shield. We haven't heard...
iPhone 17 Air Pastel Feature

iPhone 17 Reaches Key Milestone Ahead of Mass Production

Monday April 28, 2025 8:44 am PDT by
Apple has completed Engineering Validation Testing (EVT) for at least one iPhone 17 model, according to a paywalled preview of an upcoming DigiTimes report. iPhone 17 Air mockup based on rumored design The EVT stage involves Apple testing iPhone 17 prototypes to ensure the hardware works as expected. There are still DVT (Design Validation Test) and PVT (Production Validation Test) stages to...
Beyond iPhone 13 Better Blue

20th Anniversary iPhone Likely to Be Made in China Due to 'Extraordinarily Complex' Design

Monday April 28, 2025 4:29 am PDT by
Apple will likely manufacture its 20th anniversary iPhone models in China, despite broader efforts to shift production to India, according to Bloomberg's Mark Gurman. In 2027, Apple is planning a "major shake-up" for the iPhone lineup to mark two decades since the original model launched. Gurman's previous reporting indicates the company will introduce a foldable iPhone alongside a "bold"...
apple watch ultra yellow

What's Next for the Apple Watch Ultra 3 and Apple Watch SE 3

Friday April 25, 2025 2:44 pm PDT by
This week marks the 10th anniversary of the Apple Watch, which launched on April 24, 2015. Yesterday, we recapped features rumored for the Apple Watch Series 11, but since 2015, the Apple Watch has also branched out into the Apple Watch Ultra and the Apple Watch SE, so we thought we'd take a look at what's next for those product lines, too. 2025 Apple Watch Ultra 3 Apple didn't update the...
iphone 17 air iphone 16 pro

iPhone 17 Air USB-C Port May Have This Unusual Design Quirk

Wednesday April 30, 2025 3:59 am PDT by
Apple is preparing to launch a dramatically thinner iPhone this September, and if recent leaks are anything to go by, the so-called iPhone 17 Air could boast one of the most radical design shifts in recent years. iPhone 17 Air dummy model alongside iPhone 16 Pro (credit: AppleTrack) At just 5.5mm thick (excluding a slightly raised camera bump), the 6.6-inch iPhone 17 Air is expected to become ...
iPhone 17 Pro Blue Feature Tighter Crop

iPhone 17 Pro Launching Later This Year With These 13 New Features

Wednesday April 23, 2025 8:31 am PDT by
While the iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone 17 Pro Max are not expected to launch until September, there are already plenty of rumors about the devices. Below, we recap key changes rumored for the iPhone 17 Pro models as of April 2025: Aluminum frame: iPhone 17 Pro models are rumored to have an aluminum frame, whereas the iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro models have a titanium frame, and the iPhone ...
iPhone 17 Pro on Desk Feature

All iPhone 17 Models Again Rumored to Feature 12GB of RAM

Tuesday April 29, 2025 3:36 am PDT by
All upcoming iPhone 17 models will come equipped with 12GB of RAM to support Apple Intelligence, according to the Weibo-based leaker Digital Chat Station. The claim from the Chinese leaker, who has sources within Apple's supply chain, comes a few days after industry analyst Ming-Chi Kuo said that the iPhone 17 Air, iPhone 17 Pro, and iPhone 17 Pro Max will all be equipped with 12GB of RAM. ...
AirPods Pro 3 Mock Feature

AirPods Pro 3 Just Months Away – Here's What We Know

Tuesday April 29, 2025 1:30 am PDT by
Despite being more than two years old, Apple's AirPods Pro 2 still dominate the premium wireless‑earbud space, thanks to a potent mix of top‑tier audio, class‑leading noise cancellation, and Apple's habit of delivering major new features through software updates. With AirPods Pro 3 widely expected to arrive in 2025, prospective buyers now face a familiar dilemma: snap up the proven...

Top Rated Comments

danielbraun Avatar
78 months ago
Another cool trick is: when on a webpage, long-click the refresh button and select "Request Desktop Site" to view the non-mobile version of the site.
Score: 31 Votes (Like | Disagree)
WannaGoMac Avatar
78 months ago
I miss the days when the interface didn’t have all these features hidden.
Score: 22 Votes (Like | Disagree)
shieldcy Avatar
78 months ago
Here’s a very useful tip I recently discovered...

In iOS - Safari: By tapping two fingers on a link, it will open it in a new tab.
It’s like the “open in new tab” functionality on the mac.
Score: 15 Votes (Like | Disagree)
realtuner Avatar
78 months ago
I like when I click on a link that opens a new tab, clicking the back button on that page closes the tab and returns me to the tab I clicked the link from.
Score: 11 Votes (Like | Disagree)
waquzy Avatar
78 months ago
Thank you so much, even after many years of Safari usage, I didn't know most of these. :)
Score: 11 Votes (Like | Disagree)
djcerla Avatar
78 months ago
I miss the days when the interface didn’t have all these features hidden.
That’s because it didn’t have all these features.

Funny how Mac power users who use daily the epitome of hidden features that are keyboard shortcuts then complain about equally hidden features aimed at iOS power users.
Score: 9 Votes (Like | Disagree)