Latest news with #iOS26Safari
Yahoo
30-07-2025
- Yahoo
How to speed up your iPhone by clearing its cache
When you buy through links on our articles, Future and its syndication partners may earn a commission. Keeping your iPhone running at peak performance requires more than just the occasional restart, it means regularly clearing out the digital clutter that builds up over time. Cache files from apps and websites accumulate in the background, gradually eating into your storage space and slowing down your device. This becomes especially important when you're preparing to install major updates like iOS 26 beta, which needs plenty of free space and a clean system to run smoothly. Clearing your iPhone's cache is a simple maintenance task that frees up storage, improves app performance, and reduces the chance of conflicts with new software. Whether you're troubleshooting issues or preparing for the latest iOS beta, a quick cache clear can make all the difference in your phone's responsiveness. Why you should clear cache before installing iOS 26 beta (Image: © Tom's Guide) Beta software is less stable than final releases, so your device needs every advantage to run smoothly. Old cache files can conflict with new features, causing crashes or performance issues that make it hard to tell if problems stem from the beta itself or leftover data. Beta versions also require several gigabytes of free storage for installation and operation. Cache files from browsers, apps, and system processes can easily consume space that could be better used by the new software. Clearing cache before installation establishes a clean baseline, making it easier to identify genuine beta bugs versus issues caused by digital clutter. 1. Open settings (Image: © Tom's Guide) Begin by opening the Settings app on your iPhone. This is where you'll access all the options for managing your device's apps and data. 2. Tap Apps (Image: © Tom's Guide) Scroll down and tap Apps to view a list of all the applications installed on your phone. This is where you can manage all app-specific settings, including data storage and cache. 3. Tap Safari (Image: © Tom's Guide) Find Safari in the list and tap it. Safari stores a significant amount of cached data, including website files and history, which can be cleared to free up space and improve performance. 4. Clear History and Website Data (Image: © Tom's Guide ) Scroll down until you find Clear History and Website Data, then tap this option. This will remove your browsing history, cookies, and other cached website data from Safari. 5. Confirm your action (Image: © Tom's Guide) When prompted, tap Clear History to confirm. Your Safari cache will now be cleared, helping to refresh the app and improve its responsiveness. Follow Tom's Guide on Google News to get our up-to-date news, how-tos, and reviews in your feeds. Make sure to click the Follow button. More from Tom's Guide Your iPhone Notes app has a secret messaging feature — here's how to use it iOS 26 Safari lets you pick your own tab design — here's how to do it Apple Watch got an AI fitness coach — how to enable Workout Buddy
Tom's Guide
19-07-2025
- Tom's Guide
iOS 26 Safari lets you pick your own tab design — here's how to do it
Liquid Glass is giving the whole of iOS 26 a new look, and that becomes readily apparent the first time you fire up the Safari browser on your iPhone after installing the update. But even with the look of the toolbar and tab design changing, you have some say in iOS 26 Safari's layout, thanks to some customization tools that Apple has included in the update. As you may be aware, Liquid Glass is the new interface Apple is introducing across its different platforms — not just for the iPhone, but for tablets, Macs, watches and Apple TV as well. The idea is a more unified experience across Apple's devices and a general streamlining of menus. That's certainly in evidence with the tab redesign in Safari. The new default look is more compact — you get a back button, the URL/search toolbar and a more button that houses remaining controls for adding favorites and bookmarks, sharing a web page and opening new tabs. Those commands appear in a pop-up window that reflect the translucent look of Liquid Glass interface elements. This new default design is certainly minimalist — perhaps too much so for some users. Fortunately, you've got two other options for tab layouts in iOS 26 Safari, including one that will look pretty familiar to long-time iPhone users. Here's how to adjust the appearance of tabs in iOS 26 Safari, followed by some highlights of other changes you'll find in the iPhone's default browser once you install iOS 26. Get instant access to breaking news, the hottest reviews, great deals and helpful tips. To find the tab layout in Safari that suits you best, you actually need to leave the browser and head to settings. Launch the Settings app, and tap on the Apps section at the bottom of the main screen. On the next screen, find Safari and select it. Go to the Tabs section in Safari's settings and pick the layout you want. You have three choices: Compact, Bottom and Top. Not sure from the silhouettes in Safari settings as to how those tab layouts will look in the browser itself? Here's a closer look at each one. I've already described Compact, which is the default option in iOS 26 Safari. But to repeat, the emphasis here is on a minimalist layout, with most of the tab and bookmark controls available through that more menu on the right side. The emphasis is on the toolbar, where you can type in URLs and search terms as well as tap the control to access web page summaries, hide distracting items on the page, search for specific words on the page or change the font size. Bottom looks a bit more like the tab layout in iOS 18. The toolbar get its own line with back, share, bookmark and new tab buttons immediately underneath. This is actually the design I've opted for, since I find the familiar layout helps make the transition to the Liquid Glass interface feel a bit smoother. Top does exactly what you think it would — the URL and search toolbar moves to the top of the page. The other buttons — back/forward, share, bookmark and new tab — remain at the bottom. This option should appeal to anyone who balked when iOS 15 moved the Safari toolbar to the bottom of the screen. We should talk a little bit about the toolbar since it's the other interface element that's most directly affected by Apple's Liquid Glass push. As in the iOS 18 version of Safari, the toolbar shrinks as you scroll down a web page, though the transition is a little more fluid in iOS 26. The translucent look of the toolbar also adjusts to reflect the look of the page you're on — see how shaded the toolbar looks up above in the iOS 26 display of Disney's webpage. Safari sees some changes beyond layout in iOS 26, too. Advanced Fingerprinting Protection — a way for the browser to obscure data so that no one sees your digital fingerprint — moves beyond private browsing and into all browsing within Safari in iOS 26. The Add to Home Screen feature has been updated with an option to open any page as a web app so that you can open it in full screen and see it in the App Switcher. Overall, the layout is the big story in iOS 26 Safari. And the addition of customization features is consistent with Apple's approach in some other apps, such as the ability to adjust the look of photo collections in iOS 26 Photos. As with any design change, Liquid Glass will likely divide opinion, with some iPhone users embracing the new look and others objecting to different design elements. But in some apps at least, Apple is giving you the option to adjust the look and feel of Liquid Glass to better suit your taste.
