iOS Safari and the never ending duplicate Bookmarks

Joined
Jul 28, 2010
Messages
105
Reaction score
0
Points
16
Location
Delta, B.C., Canada, eh?
Your Mac's Specs
Late 2012 Mac Mini i5, macOS 10.15.4, iPhone 11 Pro Max, PowerBook G4, iMac G3/4/5
Hey all,

Anyone have any idea why safari on my iPhone 11 Pro Max (iOS 13.4) creates duplicates of amazon.ca and craigslist.org? If I delete one of them, 2 more pop up. My bookmarks should be shared via the iCloud for both my Mac and my iPhone... but I get duplicates only.

I restored my device and set up as new and the issue seemed resolved, but that's no way to live. I've spent years getting my iOS arranged the way I like it and while I can do it again if I need to, I would REALLY rather not. I have since restored my backup, issue returned.

I managed to slow the duplication by turning iCloud sync off in Firefox on both my Windows machines, but the issue persists.

Help!

Edit: Completely removed all iCloud/iTunes/Apple anything software from both Windows Machines. Issue continues.
 
Last edited:

chscag

Well-known member
Staff member
Admin
Joined
Jan 23, 2008
Messages
65,248
Reaction score
1,833
Points
113
Location
Keller, Texas
Your Mac's Specs
2017 27" iMac, 10.5" iPad Pro, iPhone 8, iPhone 11, iPhone 12 Mini, Numerous iPods, Monterey
Are you syncing bookmarks with Safari from your Mac? You need to check there to see if there are duplicates not the Windows version of Firefox.
 
OP
P
Joined
Jul 28, 2010
Messages
105
Reaction score
0
Points
16
Location
Delta, B.C., Canada, eh?
Your Mac's Specs
Late 2012 Mac Mini i5, macOS 10.15.4, iPhone 11 Pro Max, PowerBook G4, iMac G3/4/5
That's the crazy part. I was syncing them, then it all went haywire. I can't even create a new bookmark on the phone. I'm very puzzled.
 
Joined
May 21, 2012
Messages
10,703
Reaction score
1,158
Points
113
Location
Rhode Island
Your Mac's Specs
M1 Mac Studio, 11" iPad Pro 3rdGen, iPhone 13 ProMax, Watch S7, 2018 15" MBP, AirPods Pro
Are you also using the iCloud Bookmarks sync from your winOS PC's? Maybe turn just that off, for testing purposes?
 
OP
P
Joined
Jul 28, 2010
Messages
105
Reaction score
0
Points
16
Location
Delta, B.C., Canada, eh?
Your Mac's Specs
Late 2012 Mac Mini i5, macOS 10.15.4, iPhone 11 Pro Max, PowerBook G4, iMac G3/4/5
The issue corrected itself with the macOS 10.15.4 update. Thanks!
 
Joined
Dec 21, 2020
Messages
2
Reaction score
0
Points
1
I have thousands and thousands of dead bookmarks in Safari on my iPhone 12. I disabled icloud control panel (windows) from syncing with firefox and chrome. The only option I can see now is to delete thousands of dead bookmarks one by one. Surely this is a bug in safari to not have a select all options for bookmarks. Is there any other way to remove thousands of dead bookmarks? Thanks in advance.
 
Joined
Jan 1, 2009
Messages
15,453
Reaction score
3,808
Points
113
Location
Winchester, VA
Your Mac's Specs
MBP 16" 2023 (M3 Pro), iPhone 15 Pro, plus ATVs, AWatch, MacMinis (multiple)
Welcome to the forum.

Can I ask what is the concern? They don't take up much space in memory. About the only way I can think to batch delete is to reset the phone to factory and install all of your apps from the store. You'll lose all of your history and other things stored on the iPhone in doing that. You probably don't want to restore from a backup as the backup will have the history and bookmarks in it and you'll just be where you are now.

Or, you can live with it as it is.
 
Joined
Dec 21, 2020
Messages
2
Reaction score
0
Points
1
Thanks for your reply. The same approach as to deleting all junk emails should apply to bookmarks. That is when pressing the "edit" option an additional option should appear to "select all". I do find several thousand duplicated dead bookmarks problematic as I like to keep my bookmarks organised between my devices. It's only safari on my iPhone that has this problem. If there is no other way of clearing out these bookmarks I guess I will have to report this as a bug through apple care; as it clearly is a bug and could easily be remedied with a "select all" before deleting.
 
Joined
Jan 1, 2009
Messages
15,453
Reaction score
3,808
Points
113
Location
Winchester, VA
Your Mac's Specs
MBP 16" 2023 (M3 Pro), iPhone 15 Pro, plus ATVs, AWatch, MacMinis (multiple)
That's one way to design it. Not the way Apple decided and not the way I would do it, but it's certainly a design. I don't like "select all" as an option for many things. That is just too broad.

As for clearing out bookmarks, that's pretty easy if all you want is to synchronize them across your devices. Here is Apple's page on it: https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT203519
 

chscag

Well-known member
Staff member
Admin
Joined
Jan 23, 2008
Messages
65,248
Reaction score
1,833
Points
113
Location
Keller, Texas
Your Mac's Specs
2017 27" iMac, 10.5" iPad Pro, iPhone 8, iPhone 11, iPhone 12 Mini, Numerous iPods, Monterey
It's only safari on my iPhone that has this problem. If there is no other way of clearing out these bookmarks I guess I will have to report this as a bug through apple care; as it clearly is a bug and could easily be remedied with a "select all" before deleting.

Are you syncing your iPhone bookmarks with Safari on your Mac? In other words, do you have that option selected for iCloud on your Mac? If so, there is a better way to remove the bookmarks. Let us know.
 

Shop Amazon


Shop for your Apple, Mac, iPhone and other computer products on Amazon.
We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon and affiliated sites.
Top