Even if you’re surfing the internet on your new Android phone, from time to time it’s a good idea to clear out the history and cache. Clearing out the cache can improve performance, and clearing your history and auto-complete information can help improve security. Good news, the process is easy and quick so let’s take a look at this Quick-Tip.
Step 1
While in the Android browser, Tap the external menu button.
(On my Samsung Galaxy S it was located at the bottom left corner of the screen, but this can vary depending on your device.)
The menu should now appear on the screen, Tap the More option from that list.
Step 3
Tap the Settings option from the list.
Step 4
Scroll down the settings window until you get to Privacy settings.
There are quite a few things to clear here:
- Clear cache
- Clear history
- Clear all cookie data
- Clear form data
- Clear location access
Step 5
Click on everything in Step 4 above, a prompt will appear for each one. Tap OK to confirm the deletion each time.
Step 6 – Optional: Clear Passwords, and Nuke
There are two additional options at the bottom of the settings page you can opt to do if you like.
One is the Clear passwords button, that will just erase all passwords and account information that is saved on your android device. This isn’t necessary, but it can keep people from accessing your online services if your phone falls into the wrong hands.
The other option is Reset to default aka the Nuke button. One Press on the nuke button and your android browser will revert back to factory settings, clearing out everything else at the same time. I would suggest this, but it is a pain to change the browser home page so I never use this button.
Done!
After following the above steps your Android browser should be cleaned out of all history and cache files. You can rest at ease letting other people use the browser app on your device without them hijacking your Facebook account or running into an embarrassing suggested Google search.
You could do it even faster using something like Quick App Clean Cache. Its worth the payment.
Love the laser beam icons lol
6 steps to clear browser history/cache
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Refine Efficiency does it in 1 – http://refineandroid.doodlekit.com/
Sorry…there is major security bug in android browser. “clearing” the history does not stop someone using the BACK button. Your previously visited page will be loaded again.
Lim is right – between this and the google talk app retaining ‘off the record’ chats after ending the chat, It’s a privacy nightmare. I couldn’t, in good conscience, recommend this platform to a business client – it’s too full of holes.
This does not work. Nothing clears from my browser memory.
Am trying to clear my search history on google for on my andriod tablet , the information you have given seem not to work on it as it only cleared the browsing history but not the search history . please help me out thanks
What version of Android and FireFox is this written for? Your screen shots do not match my Droid incredible
2.2 if Im correct.
of course the screenshots wont match your droind incredible!!! cant you read?? he says he is using samsung galaxy S..
and these steps works perfectly to delete browsing history!! he didnt say its to delete search history..
It was great advice to clear my browser history thanks alot
This works beautifully. Thank you!
My motorola atrix only displays a portion of the full web site http://www.personalsecuritytechnology.com
I’ve cleared everything… even used the “nuke” option.
At one time this worked fine.
I then made some template changes to my hosted web site and now can only see a portion of the site. Anyone who cares to take a look will see the entire web site on their PC.
I’d be very curious if you see the entire site on your cell phone or only a portion of it as on my cell phone.
I have been looking EVERYWHERE for how to do this. Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!
Hi Austin,
this didn’t work on my HTC Evo, so I’ve installed Android Delete History PRO and now it’s working great
Thank you
Can’t find the menu pointing to settings but after reading this tips, now I can clear browsing history on my android phone.. Thanks
Thank you so much!!! Worked like a charm
Hi Amber,
If you’ve been deleting the history from your device, then you should be okay. What this person likely meant was that your connection can be monitored. For example. if you were viewing it over 3G your cellular carrier can access a log of every site ever visited.
In the case of WiFi, the router (wireless broadcast device) usually retains logs of all the sites accessed through it. Depending on where you are connecting from there could be additional switches in place between the router and the internet service provider. Any number of these could be tracking your history. The only way to find out what is tracking you is to know the hardware setup.
If you’re at home, its probably just your router broadcasting and then the connection goes directly to the internet service provider (comcast, verizon, timewarner, etc). Just login to the router and clear out the history and you’re set. But if you’re at work then it’s a whole other ballgame. At work it would depend on what type of job you have. Most companies monitor all network traffic going through their systems. If you work in any type of medium-large office this is the case. If you work in a smaller office it might not have the resources to set this up. An office that isn’t IT oriented probably doesn’t care about browser history that much, for example a doctors or dentist’s office might not track usage.
There’s also an interesting factor to consider. Because you were browsing the internet on your phone, the company might not know who you are, especially if you work in a large office. The exception of course would be if the office provided the phone. But if its your personal phone that you brought from home and used to connect to company wifi, the company would probably have a hard time tracking you down, but it isn’t impossible.
The internet service provider can also track your history, but usually won’t keep logs longer than a couple days.
Conclusion:
————
Lots of things can track you over WiFi. If you’re at home you can clear the history on your router. But you can’t clear the history from your Internet Service Provider. At work there isn’t much you can do other than perhaps bribing the network admin to clear your history, but if you connected using your personal phone you probably don’t have much to worry about as long aren’t continually looking at sites that aren’t safe for work. If you want to truly avoid being tracked, you’d have to purchase an anonymous VPN connection and use that.
I found that my android (it’s an HTC Wildfire S) has a proxy settings area and when I go inside, it says enable wifi proxy with a little box to tick. I found that the box was unticked the whole time which means it wasn’t enabled. Does this help?
I’ll explain my situation. I live in a place without wifi. But there is wifi at my parents house, so I sleep over sometimes just to download stuff onto my phone using wifi. And my brother told me once to be careful because things can be viewed through a proxy server. But I’m wondering.. if the box that I mentioned above was unticked… is it still possible?
Also… I ALWAYS use incognito mode in Google Chrome on their computers and any other computers. Does this track my history? Or will it just be blank on the proxy server?
Thanks for helping.