How can I downgrade Safari 6.1 to 6.0.5?

Ok, here is a more simple way to restore your previous version of Safari.

No need for download, save of previous version yourself, re-install the whole system or whatever... as Apple did the work for you while applying last update on your computer : the previous version is saved here (as a tar.gz archive):

/Library/Application Support/Apple/.Safari6.1-10.8Archive/SafariArchive.tar.gz

So, all you need to do is open a terminal and type the following commands :

First type :

sudo tar -xvf /Library/Application\ Support/Apple/.Safari6.1-10.8Archive/SafariArchive.tar.gz -C /

Type your (admin) password while asked.

This will replace all the needed files installed for Safari to work.

Then you have to type this command :

sudo rm -rf /private/var/db/receipts/com.apple.pkg.Safari6.*

BE CAREFUL WITH THAT ONE and type it exactly as written above (copy/paste).

This command deletes the receipt of Safari from /var/db/receipts. It is perfectly safe as long as you type it the way it is shown here.

Then restart and TADA... old Safari version is back... and nothing else has been changed 😉

This trick can be found here : http://hints.macworld.com/article.php?story=20110722154439693

Oh, and by the way, I agree every single comment here about the new version of Safari... What the heck they did ? 😀

It is slower, the history page is awful and not usable anymore to search pages, and there are several little things everwhere that are really annoying that we didn't have before. Looks like it is a regression.

See you

has anuone tried or used plmegalo's method?

If ever it can be useful I did this three times on three different machines under OS X 10.8.5 and it worked like a charm. However, I always do a timemachine backup before any manipulation of that kind and of course this is the least you can do to avoid bad surprises 😉...

You can see in the link I gave that this method worked in the past also without any problem, and if it can give you a clue, Apple's safari update process won't create that tar.gz if it wasn't useful anymore. Don't you think 😀

Anyway, if you don't feel comfortable with the command line interface, then use the other method. Though I find it far more risky to my sense as you can lose more files by re-installing the whole system. I won't do it, cause I got many personnal tuned things in my OS.

Hope it has helped you decide what to do.

I can confirm that plmegalo's method works perfectly. I'm running Mac OS 10.8.5 and I'm now back to Safari 6.0.5. Hated the new Safari bookmarks, I wonder what Apple is playing at nowadays.

dear plmegalo, my apologies if my massage seemed mistrustful. i am a new mac user and honestly i am scared to experiment with terminal, moreover, i havent done it before. i will try ur methode =)

Absolutely no worries, I had no doubt and that's why I said those things about feeling comfortable about line command interface and being very careful with it. I agree with you and think you're perfectly right to ask : it's better asking than doing something that makes you lose your data. Really no problem. 😀

I know what you mean when it comes to using Terminal, it can, if used incorrectly, cause havoc, but if you just copy and paste the commands you won't go wrong.

When you paste in the first command and enter your password Terminal will go through a process which will look a little daunting as you watch it go through its processing, don't worry, just paste in the last command and when finished restart and your old Safari will be back.

Indeed, quite strange and didn't understand either when I used Safari after this update. As already said it really looks like a regression. But that kind of things happens in software life...

i guess you missed this followup: Re: How can I downgrade Safari 6.1 to 6.0.5?

Very nice, thank you! The command is specific for Lion 10.8. On 10.7, only one digit needs to be changed to make it work there as well (change the '8' into '7'):

sudo tar -xvf /Library/Application\ Support/Apple/.Safari6.1-10.7Archive/SafariArchive.tar.gz -C /

The other command to delete the receipt seems to work without problem.

Nice Job to...

plmegalo France

I am back to the Good old Clean Apple look I fell in LOVE with, worked like a Charm !

What a terrible update to push on the Fans of the Mac.

i think something went wrong and safari stopped work at all =(

Dear plmegalo,

A super solution, MERCI!

SomeMacUser1,

Excellent reminder, thanks.

@Plmegalo & SomeMacUser1

A BIG thank you !

The 6.1 update gave me several problems too (slow down, a few crashes, couldn't use plugins like addblock or clicktoflash, some Flash animations I use at work didn't load at all...).

Was quite frightened to use some "sudo" command and missed a heart beat when I pressed "enter" but all worked as you said (I'm still on Lion)

Great tip ! 😀