Safari tabs from last session all restore as Untitled

After restarting my MacBook all my Safari tabs from last session are shown as Untitled and the windows open blank. This despite me having "Reopen all windows from last session" checked in Preferences. So I seem to have lost about a dozen windows, most of them with multiple tabs.

My History is still there but some of these windows date back months, so I have no hope of finding them.

Any solutions, please?

Safari version 15.0 running in Catalina version 10.15.7

MacBook Air 13″, macOS 10.15

Posted on Sep 28, 2021 2:07 AM

Top-ranking reply

AnTiarnaDorcha

Level 1

12 points

Posted on Oct 4, 2021 4:33 AM

I have had a similar problem, when I shut down my machine and come back a day later, it opens with no old tabs despite also having it set to restore tabs. I found a solution. Safari 15 saves the saved tabs in a new location in comparison to previous versions. So the Lastsession.plist file won't help here (it did help me when I updated to 15 and lost the tabs). Instead, you need to be able to restore files (e.g., from Time Machine) to here:

~/Users/[user name]/Library/Containers/com.apple.Safari/Data/Library/Safari

There are three files that start with "SafariTabs.db" and all three have to be restored for it to work, but it did!

I got this advice from https://www.reddit.com/r/Safari/comments/pvcz1v/safari_15_and_lastsessionplist/heb0yre/, user SeraCarina gets the credit.

I don't yet know whether this glitch is a one-off or I'll be doing this until Apple fixes it. I have just grabbed the 15.1 beta so that may help (but it didn't fix the issue that was in place, hopefully it won't perpetuate it).

I also feel like it may be a Catalina/Safari15 issue. Only just from finding others with the issue, they seem to be on Catalina, lots don't have this problem. But this conclusion could be wrong. I just happen to also be on Catalina.

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21 replies

Oct 30, 2021 2:32 AM in response to Bob_127

Have you tried the above steps? It has worked consistently for me but of course you need to have a backup of some kind. The 15.1 version doesn’t seem to have fixed the issue, still happens but not every time I have shut down.

Dec 9, 2021 8:55 AM in response to AnTiarnaDorcha

I am not clever or savvy enough to understand this. Could someone clarify? I accidentally let them update my software last night and when I tried to open Safari, it had eliminated my entire last session. I keep many windows/tabs open as reference for my work and now it is all gone.

Did Apple just wait until Steve Jobs was gone to tank their products?

Jan 10, 2022 5:51 PM in response to Michael620801

So I'm not the only one having all these issues on my MacBook Pro, which has gotten much worse with the last update. But Mail has always been an issue, takes forever to load. I have never understood why Mail works so poorly on Apple. Laptop has taken an hour to load at times, which includes email, so I can get to a Zoom link for an appt time. I've had to resort to small screen on iPhone so as not to miss the meeting. Safari is crashing constantly, as is the entire iOS causing laptop to restart numerous times. Spinning ball constantly. Not responding issues. The open windows all revert to Start Page for some time now. I'm not a tech person, so not sure I can follow some complicated instructions, as shown above. At least I found someone discussing the issue: Jan 10, 2022. Not sure when I did the last update but it was in 2021.

SATRAF

Level 1

18 points

Oct 4, 2021 4:42 AM in response to AnTiarnaDorcha

Many thanks to AnTiarnaDorcha for the above message. I'll throw myself at it later.

Jan 9, 2022 9:19 AM in response to AnTiarnaDorcha

Thanks - the "merge all windows" did the trick, and got back all hundred odd tabs I'd lost, albeit in one mega-window.

Jan 11, 2022 2:53 PM in response to raaid

I'm not exactly tech savvy anymore. Where do I find this library? I can't find it on my harddrive or desktop, and it doesn't come up when I put it in the URL bar.

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Safari tabs from last session all restore as Untitled