Delete Individual URLs from Web Browser Address Bar history
Most of today’s web browsers try to help save you a little bit of time and effort here and there. One of the areas they’re doing this is completing a URL address for you if you have typed it in previously into the browser address bar. If you typed in and went to “ishouldnotbehere.com” last week, when you start to type in letters such as “ish” into the address bar, the browser will detect you have typed this in before and show the full address as an option to try and save time typing the whole thing in again.
This might be all well and good, but there are times you might not want a specific address to be kept in the history and certainly don’t want it showing up when someone else starts typing a few letters into the bar so they can see where you have been! What you want to do is without completely deleting all the auto complete entries, just delete all traces of the ones you don’t wish to keep around.
Each of the most popular web browsers Internet Explorer, Firefox, Opera and Google Chrome each have different methods in deleting individual entries from the address bar. Here we’ll show you how for each browser.
OperaOpera is incredibly easy to delete the unwanted website in both the history drop down and the auto complete while typing.
Simply type part of the URL in and when it shows in the history drop down, highlight it and with the mouse and click the “x” on the right of the line to delete, the same for any other entries. Alternatively use the arrow keys and delete each entry with Shift+Del. Now try typing it in again and the address will be completely gone.
Internet Explorer
Although deleting the initial entry in the drop down box in the Internet Explorer address bar is pretty easy, the auto complete address as you type cannot be removed from within the browser unless you delete ALL website history.
To delete the main entry from the drop down simply start typing the address in and when it appears, highlight it and click the red x to the right. This URL will now be removed if you click on the drop down of previous typed addresses. But if you look at the image above, you will see that if you start to type the address into the bar again another auto complete under “History” will still be there. Even though it has a red x delete button, it doesn’t work and keeps coming back the next time you type.
To get rid of the History auto complete entry requires the use of a small 3rd party utility called IEHistoryView from Nirsoft. Download, extract the zip and run the portable tool.
Click the URL column header to sort the entries, and then you have to put a tick next to each entry of the address you want to delete from the history. Use the binocular icon on the toolbar to search if you have lots of history items. When you have selected ALL instances of the URL address in question, press Del or click the red cross icon to remove them. Now go to IE and type part of the address and now you should get no history entry for it.
On the next page, we’ll show you how to delete individual history URL’s from the Firefox and Chrome web browsers.
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Brilliant – still works in Firefox 13!
PC …….. bang on the money!!! dodged a bullet there
thank you man
Thank you, shift-delete worked for me, as you said.
thank you now my brother won’t see what I’m doing :)
Thanks for the tip, Raymond!
Thanks, that worked. I have been wondering is that possible for a long time.
it works…thank you so much..
Absolutely awesome trick! I’ve been looking for something like this for ages… because firefox seems to randomly keep some address in your address bar history, it’s great to finally get to delete them without deleting all history.
Thank you so much you are the man!
It works great!
Thanks!
By the way this works for Mac as well. Thanks.
Thanks man it works… as easy as one two three :D
thank you.
Nice one! perfect.
you sir have saved my ASS!
oh my. thank you so much. that was driving me insane!
Well taught! This is very useful
I am not THAT computer savvy and yet I was able to follow your instructions quite easily and it worked!
very useful. thanks
Thank you, first deleting the bookmark and then the address entry worked like a charm!
Thanks. You have made it so simple.
Sweet deal been trying to figure this out for a bit myself thanks for the awesome tip ***** ^5
Thanks that solved the problem
Yes it works, I was really convinced that it will not go away. Thanks for this board that I managed to get rid of it. Thanks
It definitely works. Thanks for the tip man
Thank you so much!
Thanks
This is a very good tip. Thanks for sharing.
You are the man. Thanks
You helped immensely. Great tip!
What a relief to find exactly what I needed and it works perfectly without mucking up everything else.
Awesome, worked right away, thanks a lot!
Thank you so much.
It worked like a charm…
thank you for this tip
Thank you!! My problem is now resolved
Thanks for putting an end to my frustration.
Great tip!
Adrian
ahh, cool, thanks for that. I was desperately seeking a way of deleting my page history without having to erase everything. You don’t know how much you’ve helped :)
awesome clear method thanks!!!