How to Delete Cookies on iPhone (Safari and Chrome)

To delete cookies on iPhone and keep your browsing history, open Settings, tap Apps, tap Safari, tap Advanced, then tap Website Data and choose Remove All Website Data. To clear cookies and history in one go, use Clear History and Website Data on the main Safari settings screen instead.

Knowing how to delete cookies on iPhone is worth a minute of your time. Cookies are the small files websites leave on your phone so they can recognise you on your next visit. They keep you signed in to your email, remember what is sitting in a shopping basket, and — less welcomely — let advertising networks follow you from one site to the next.

Apple gives you two routes to do it, and they are not interchangeable. One removes cookies and site data while leaving your history alone. The other clears both together. Either way you will be signed out of most websites, so it is worth knowing which button you are about to press.

How to delete cookies on iPhone in Safari

This is the route that removes cookies and cached site data without touching your browsing history.

1. Open Settings on your iPhone.

2. Tap Apps, then scroll down and tap Safari.

3. Scroll to the bottom of the Safari screen and tap Advanced.

4. Tap Website Data. You will see a list of sites and how much space each one is using.

5. Tap Remove All Website Data, then confirm with Remove Now.

Apple describes this screen as clearing the data used for tracking, along with the data websites save so you can log in faster. In plain terms: the cookies go, your history stays.

Clearing cookies and history together

If you want everything gone, go to Settings > Apps > Safari and tap Clear History and Website Data. iOS asks which timeframe you want to clear before it does anything, so you can remove the last hour rather than years of browsing.

Confirm with Clear History and it is done. Apple notes that this does not change your AutoFill information, so saved names, addresses and card details are left alone.

Deleting one site's cookies instead of all of them

You do not have to clear everything. The Website Data screen lists sites individually, with the heaviest storage users shown first.

Tap Show All Sites to see the full list, then swipe left on a site and tap Delete to remove only that one. This is the tool to reach for when a single site is misbehaving and you would rather not be signed out of everything else you use.

Blocking cookies instead of deleting them

Deleting cookies is a one-off. If you want to stop them being set at all, Safari's Advanced settings also carry a Block All Cookies toggle.

Treat it with some caution. With cookies blocked outright, sites cannot keep you signed in and cannot remember preferences such as a dark theme, and some will not load properly until you switch it back off. For most people, clearing cookies occasionally is the more practical habit.

Chrome, Firefox and other browsers

Safari's settings govern Safari and nothing else. If you browse in Chrome, its cookies live inside the Chrome app and have to be cleared from there.

In Chrome for iPhone, tap the More menu and choose Delete Browsing Data. Set your time range, tap Browsing Data, select Cookies, Site Data, confirm your selection, then tap Delete Browsing Data. Firefox keeps the equivalent controls in its own settings, under a data management screen.

What this does not do

Clearing cookies is not the same as clearing an app's cache. Apps store their own separate pile of data, and emptying that is a different job — our guide to clearing cache on iPhone covers where it actually lives.

It also does not touch your saved passwords, which sit in the Passwords app rather than in Safari's website data. Signing back in should be a Face ID prompt rather than a memory test, and if you are not sure what is stored, here is how to find passwords on iPhone.

And it does not make you anonymous. Deleting cookies removes what has already been stored. It does not stop new cookies being set the moment you load that site again.

Common questions

Will I be signed out of everything? Of most things, yes. Cookies are what hold your sessions open, so expect to log back in to the sites you use regularly.

Does deleting cookies free up storage? A little, but not much. Website data is usually measured in megabytes, so if you are genuinely short on space this is not the lever to pull.

Should I do this on a schedule? There is no need to make a routine of it. It earns its place when a site is behaving oddly, when you are handing the phone to someone else, or when you want to reset the picture advertisers have built of you.

If the option isn't there

If Clear History and Website Data is greyed out, Apple gives two reasons: either there is nothing left to clear, or Screen Time web content restrictions are blocking it. Check Settings > Screen Time > Content & Privacy Restrictions.

If you cannot find Safari under Apps at all, you are on an older version of iOS. Before the Settings app was reorganised, Safari sat directly in the main Settings list, and every step after that point is the same.