Several users have reported that their Safari bookmarks have disappeared. Users have also reported that Safari bookmarks do not appear to be syncing properly.
If you’ve suddenly lost your bookmarks, or your bookmarks are not syncing, try closing the Safari app. To do so:
- Double press the home button.
- Recently used apps will appear on the bottom of your screen.
- Locate the Safari icon (scroll right by swiping if you don’t see it). This will display a list of apps running in the background on your iPad/iPhone.
- Tap and hold the Safari icon until it wiggles.
- Tap the red minus sign.
- Click home button
- Tap the Safari icon and restart Safari
Related:
October 10, 2012 at 10:17 AM
I have had that problem happen to my ihpone too and this is how I got rid of the problem. This should help some people out.
December 28, 2012 at 2:19 PM
Thanks for posting your notes folks. Unfortunately my MacBook Pro is so old (6+ years) and has such an outdated OS (10.6.8) with maxed out memory and cache, that it will not allow me to update to Lion, so as a result I am unable to add iCloud to the laptop. To get around the hassle of not being able to sync my Address Book and Safari bookmarks via Wi-Fi, I simply used the cable (which came with the iPad) went to iTunes and synced from there. Like magic, all is good now between my MBP and iPad.
October 10, 2012 at 3:39 PM
Thanks for posting this! I usually kill an app when it’s misbehaving but I hadn’t tried that when my Bookmarks disappeared. Instead Zi tried disabling and reenabling iCloud, to no avail. Thanks again for the help.
November 2, 2012 at 8:49 PM
This fixes a problem that should never happen in the first place!
November 4, 2012 at 8:25 PM
Thanks so much. Worked like a charm and was super easy!
December 16, 2012 at 6:44 AM
Thank you! Thank you!! Worked – Bookmarks are magically back – Saving this fix – have a feeling I might need it again – Was ready to run to the Apple Store
December 18, 2012 at 11:38 AM
Thanks, this fix worked great.
December 20, 2012 at 9:57 AM
Could not get Safari to quit so I rebooted phone and the bookmarks came out of hiding.
January 24, 2013 at 2:27 PM
Strangely, for my phone, rebooting didn’t work, but closing the program as above did work.
January 24, 2013 at 2:32 PM
Ehm…. then when I restart the problem comes right back.
December 27, 2012 at 9:04 AM
Thanks! This worked great….but why did it happen in the first place??
December 28, 2012 at 2:28 PM
I believe it is because iCloud is not installed on my MacBook Pro.
December 27, 2012 at 4:29 PM
Brilliant. Love to know why they disappeared in first place. Cache problem?
December 28, 2012 at 2:30 PM
Thanks! I believe disappeared because iCloud is not installed on your Mac along with the built in version on your iPad. This is only a guess!
December 30, 2012 at 1:37 AM
Amazing – worked first time and saved a lot of stress! Thank you
December 31, 2012 at 9:38 AM
It was my pleasure Sarah. May your 2103 be truly rewarding!!
January 2, 2013 at 5:30 PM
None of these things worked for me….
January 2, 2013 at 6:32 PM
I was gonna go crazy before I read this article. Amazing yet simple! Thank you!!!
January 6, 2013 at 8:49 PM
It didn’t work! I am so frustrated. I had lots of bookmarks, some of which were very important. No idea how I’m going to recreate them.
January 18, 2013 at 8:10 AM
I too lost my Bookmarks and History, all I had in my History was ‘Bing’. I tried the fix which closes the Safari app but it did not work. I then did a hard reset, in which you turn off the iPad by sliding the bit on the screen to force it to close, I athen turned it back on and found my History and Reading List had returned. Maybe this will help Susana.
January 18, 2013 at 8:29 AM
That didn’t work for me. Mine came back after doing a restart:- “Restart iPad: Hold down the Sleep/Wake button until the red slider appears. Slide your finger across the slider to turn off iPad. To turn iPad back on, hold down the Sleep/Wake until the Apple logo appears.”
Excerpt From: Inc, Apple. “iPad User Guide for iOS 5.1.” Apple Inc., 2012. iBooks.
When I went back into Safari, the Bookmarks etc. had returned.
January 13, 2013 at 2:05 PM
Thanks for this info, worked like a charm! All my bookmarks are synced over wifi to safari on my desktop so I was confused on why they disappeared out of nowhere on my phone to begin with, but all is good now thankfully! Whew! Have had a couple ‘oh crap’ panic moments ever since I transferred everything f/ my 4 to my new iPhone 5 & was thinking NO NOT AGAIN! Apple, you’ve got to quit doing this to me or I’m gonna have gray hair in my 20′s!
January 20, 2013 at 1:05 PM
Thanks so very much. This had been frustrating me all day and this fixed the problem straight away.
January 21, 2013 at 12:11 AM
Seems ICloud has replaced all my iPad Bookmarks with those on my Mac!! How do I get them back? They were very critical to our current trip planning. Very annoying!!!
January 24, 2013 at 4:31 PM
I rebooted my IPad twice, still no bookmarks. Then I did a drag down on the empty Bookmark list, like you do to update your email inbox or Facebook, and all the bookmarks were back.
February 28, 2013 at 3:49 PM
Happens to me every day. I close Safari, reopen, and my bookmarks are still not there. I go a step further and shut off my ipad after I close Safari, and that only restores my bookmarks half of the time. Then the problem just comes back again…frustrating.
March 8, 2013 at 12:25 AM
Thanks for the tip. This fixed things for me for my iphone 4. I’ve had this happen a few times now but never knew how to fix it. In the past I’ve just had the problem seemingly fix itself after a few days. Who knows, maybe for those times I did something but didn’t know it. Or, just like they all disappear for some reason, they just reappear for some reason. Craziness.
March 8, 2013 at 4:40 AM
Thank you for this! My bookmarks just disappeared for the 1st time and I was freaking out, but this did the trick!
March 9, 2013 at 8:47 AM
Closing safari and turning phone off and back on totally worked ! Thank goodness
March 14, 2013 at 5:51 AM
I would consider enabling iCloud so that your bookmarks are automatically synced between various devices. This also allows for easy installation of bookmarklets such as the Evernote web clipper or Pinterest Pin it button. Once you add them to Safari on a Mac, then are “synced” to other devices that have iCloud enabled.
March 19, 2013 at 7:09 PM
Thanks so much for your post. My bookmarks were gone from my ipad and by following these steps I was able to restart Safari and my bookmarks were recovered. Thanks for your help.
March 29, 2013 at 7:48 AM
This is only a temporary fix and the bookmarks will continue to disappear and reappear randomly. How about Apple fixes the problem instead of applying a Bandaid to it.
March 30, 2013 at 7:40 AM
Thank you thank you! I was so stressed, but this worked in two seconds and all my cherished bookmarks are now back in their folder. Whew.
Thanks!
March 31, 2013 at 11:40 PM
Safari bookmarks disappear on iPad/iPhone – Apple Toolbox
April 15, 2013 at 7:29 AM
Worked great!
April 19, 2013 at 1:47 AM
Thank you very much … I thought I lost my bookmarks! It was a great help:)
Cheers!
May 8, 2013 at 9:23 AM
Same here, happens randomly. How about fixing the problem! It’s quite irritating.
May 8, 2013 at 11:48 PM
This is very helpful !!! Thank you so very much !!!
May 9, 2013 at 7:29 PM
Another potential fix is to clear your safari history and cookie data in the safari settings
Settings-safari-clear history/clear cookies and data
May 19, 2013 at 10:33 AM
Brilliant! Thanks for the fix…….thought I’d lost all my bookmarks and had tried everything I knew! The fix was so easy…….
June 16, 2013 at 5:43 AM
Awesome! This worked! Thankyou