Safari tab groups lost after macOS update 26.2

Only problem with this plan is that most people who have the problem won't see this solution until they have the problem.

In my case, it was too late. In my husband's case, he only has an iPad and iPhone and can't do manual recovery, as described. I do wish Apple would:

1. Fix this
2. Own this

With all recent changes, Apple’s hardware and software reliability was the last reason to use it instead of Android and linux. 

And there at least you can plan and work around such stuff, having all the access you need to restore, fiddle and fix whatever’s bothering you. With such lack of quality control, Apple’s walledness becomes a really serious limitation.

For all the years I have used Firefox on Windows and Mac (that’s more than 15 years), there wasn’t a single time my tabs disappeared. Even after I went over to Safari and didn’t even open Firefox for 1-2 years, it still never dumped my tabs or settings after updates. And their budget is so much much lower than Apple, yet somehow they nailed it.

I use [a word I apparently can not mention on this forum] versions of macOS and iOS often, and it did happen to me 4 or 5 times already, but this is the second time it happens on the release version. What a disgrace.

What is puzzling and disturbing to me is why Apple chose to store these in a database vs. a folder structure with weblocs. A database might be "technically superior," but I've found it's when, not if, a database eventually gets corrupted. A folder structure might have quite a few small files and may be slower to access, but there are plenty of small files in the user/system Library if you take a look around.

99% certain they did it in the database simply because they wanted to use CloudKit for synchronization. No other reason really. There’s no performance difference unless there are tens of thousands of tabs, and really there’s a lot more weird rubbish in their database that slows things down (they store plist binary data in some columns of this database!..)

Well, this just got worse...

Updated to MacOS 26.4 overnight and now this fix no longer works.

Now, after the Safari tab groups disappear, I close Safari, shut off wi-fi (which I didn't need before), do the Time Machine restore of the key files and reopen Safari (which has always worked since I first learned of it), my tab group show. After turning wi-fi back on, a few seconds later, all tab group windows clear out to a single empty start page tab.

Ugh...

Time to give Morpheby's fix a try.

Anyone else having similar results?

I'm having the same issue. I've also installed iPad OS 26.2 and iOS 26.2 and my tab groups aren't showing up on my iPhone or iPad either.

I have exactly the same issue, iPhone and MacBook pro, after 26.2…

My iPad groups and tabs in safari were just replaced with my iMac groups and tabs. I want mt iPad. Stuff back! How do I that?

I was already on iOS 26.2 but all my iPhone tabs disappeared today. What the heck?

This isn't just Tahoe, it is the entire 26.2 ecosystem. My husband is iPad and iPhone only and all of his tab groups are gone.

Very helpful. Thank you for this solution!!

Anybody found a way to make the suggested Top-Ranked workaround stick?

I know. Thanks for that. What if one has hundreds of tab groups? A huge pain, given also apparently no guarantee that it will stick, as per the testimonials here on behalf of Apple Support.