Size of Safari application seems large?

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Level 1

9 points

Size of Safari application seems large?

Hi!

I was recently making more space available on my imac HD and I noticed (via system settings>storage) that the application size of Safari is 3.6GB. It seems a little high, so I did the following:

Cleared caches via the developer menu
Reset cookies/removed all website data
Cleared the reading list
Cleaned out my bookmarks

And it still remains at 3.6GB. I have no Safari extensions, so I don't know what's causing this. Is this size normal? The app seems to run ok when in use.

Thanks in advance!

iMac (2017 – 2020)

Posted on Jul 27, 2023 3:37 PM

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Answer 1

DerekM87

Community Specialist

Jul 28, 2023 12:28 PM in response to Doug Dellis

Hey Doug Dellis,

That app size does seem a bit high. Given the steps you've already taken, we'd advise starting your Mac up into safe mode, empty your trash if needed, and then check the size again there.

Start up your Mac in safe mode - Apple Support

Should the app still be several GB in size, restart again to exit safe mode and the contact Apple Support to take a closer look.

Get Support

Take care.

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Answer 2

Doug Dellis Author

Level 1

9 points

Jul 28, 2023 9:20 PM in response to Doug Dellis

UPDATE: I wanted to post this in case anyone else has this issue.

As I mentioned below in this thread, booting up in safe mode did not help to diagnose this issue, sadly.

I did some research, and a reddit user helped me pinpoint the culprit(s) within my ~Library folder - the size of the application when listed in the "storage" pane of the system settings was 3.6GB due primarily to two files:

1) "safaritabs.db" file in Library>Containers>Safari (2.2GB)

2) Library>Containers>Safari>Data>Library>Caches>com.apple.safari (1.3GB)

I moved "Safaritabs.db" to my desktop (instead of deleting, to be safe) and deleted the "com.apple.safari" folder (I was informed this was safe to delete) - and restarted.

The result is my Safari application size is now down to 1.3GB. I'm not sure if this is "the way" to fix this, or if it will recur at a later date, but I figured I'd share with the community.

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Answer 3

Doug Dellis Author

Level 1

9 points

Jul 28, 2023 6:07 PM in response to DerekM87

Thanks for answering.

I started in safe mode as recommended. Oddly, NO applications were listed in the "applications" list in the "storage" panel of system setting while in safe mode - no apps at all.

I restarted, and as I thought, Safari appeared on the list again taking up 3.54GB of size on the hard drive. (Side note, whenever I load this panel, Safari shows up as ZERO bytes until I launch it).

Anyhow, it's very weird. That said, performance seems to be fine. Go figure.

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Size of Safari application seems large?

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