Safari address bar not using search engine

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Level 1

5 points

Safari address bar not using search engine

My Safari address bar only acts as a search engine occasionally. Usually when I type something into the address bar that is not a URL Safari defaults to a Google search. For example if I typed "how to feed your goldfish" in the address bar Safari would add "-- search google" to the phrase I would be redirected to a Google search. Occasionally, when I type a Google search into the address bar Safari treats it as a URL; "how to feed your goldfish" would redirect to the webpage how%20to%20feed%20your%20goldfish.com. Any ideas why? My goldfish is hungry

MacBook Pro (Retina, 15-inch, Late 2013), OS X El Capitan (10.11.1), Safari 9.0.1

Posted on Dec 21, 2015 5:36 PM

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Answer 1

Dec 21, 2015 5:43 PM in response to DarkShicks

From your Safari menu bar click Safari > Preferences then select the Privacy tab.

Click: Remove All Website Data

Quit then relaunch Safari to test.

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Answer 2

Linc Davis

Level 10

209,739 points

Dec 21, 2015 6:50 PM in response to DarkShicks

Please disable all Safari extensions and test. If the problem is resolved, re-enable the extensions one or a few at a time until you find the culprit.

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Answer 3

DarkShicks Author

Level 1

5 points

Dec 22, 2015 2:15 PM in response to Carolyn Samit

Tried it. Didn't solve, thanks for the suggestion

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Answer 4

DarkShicks Author

Level 1

5 points

Dec 22, 2015 2:37 PM in response to Linc Davis

Thanks for the suggestion. That doesn't appear to be the problem. The problem seems to be coming from Safari's "Quick Website Search" feature. The searches that tend to fail are usually associated with the one's that auto-load on that list. For example, today I tried to look up "Goldfish won't eat goldfish crackers" into the search bar and I was redirected to the failed page "Goldfish%20won't%20eat%20goldfish%20crackers". I noticed that Goldfish.com was listed as one of the sites on the Quick Website Search. I disabled the feature (Safari<Preferences<Enable Quick Website Search) and I no longer have the problem. This seems to only happen when the internet is not responding quickly.

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Answer 5

Linc Davis

Level 10

209,739 points

Dec 22, 2015 3:04 PM in response to DarkShicks

Interesting. Thanks for the update.

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