How to Create Favorites Folders in iPhone Safari?

Bookmarking is an essential routine when using browsers to keep the page for later reference. Though you can easily bookmark webpages in iPhone with the in-built Safari browser, it is a good idea to organize your bookmarked content in folders. The best way is to create folders in favorites section and access them across your devices by syncing in iCloud. In this article, I will explore how to create favorites folder in iPhone Safari browser and manage the bookmarked items easily. If you are also using Mac, checkout how to manage favorite folders in Mac Safari.

Bookmark Webpages to Favorites in Safari

Adding webpages to favorites section is a straightforward process in iPhone.

• Tap the “Share” icon showing in the bottom of Safari screen.
• Scroll down and select “Add to Favorites” option.
• Change the name if required and tap “Save” to add the page to your favorites.

Create New Empty Favorites Folder in iPhone Safari

Though there are no options to create a folder while adding a favorite, the share section has two options – “Add to Bookmark” and “Add to Favorites”. If you want to create a folder, then you need to follow the bookmark route instead of choosing favorites option. Follow the below instructions in Safari iPhone or iPad to create a folder under favorites section.

• Open Safari and tap the “Bookmarks” icon showing on the bottom of the screen and go to “Favorites” section.

• Tap “Edit” link showing on the bottom left corner and then tap “New Folder” option.

• Type the name for your folder and tap “done” from the keyboard.

• Tap “Done” on the multiple screens to close all and you will see the newly create folder showing under “Favorites” section.

Create Folder While Booking Webpages to Favorites

The above option first creates a folder which you can select while adding a bookmark. Instead of that, you can directly create a folder when adding a bookmark.

• Open the page in Safari and tap on the “Share” icon from the bottom of the screen. Instead of selecting “Add to Favorites”, select “Add to Bookmarks” option. Alternatively, you can tap and hold the “Bookmarks” icon at the bottom of the page and then select “Add to Bookmarks” option.
• Tap the “Favorites” showing under “Location” heading and select “New Folder” option (here you can choose the folder if you have previously created as explained in the above method).

• Type the name for your folder and tap “Save” link showing on top right corner.

• If required, change the webpage name and tap “Save” to add the page to newly created folder under favorites section.

Managing Favorites in Folders

Safari offers lot of useful ways to make use of the bookmarked items in the folder. You can search, sort and reorder the positions of the folders to improve your routine work. Tap on the “Bookmarks” icon showing on bottom of the Safari Start Page. This will open “Bookmarks” section and tap on “Favorites” option where you can find all created folders.

• Swipe down to reveal a search box to type and find the favorite pages quickly.
• If you want to delete a folder along with all the sub-folders and pages, swipe left on the folder and select “Delete” option. You can also tap and hold the folder to open menu items and then select “Delete” option. Select “Open in New Tabs” option to open all the pages in that folder at once.
• You can simply drag and move any folder up or down to change the order. Similarly, you can drag and move the webpages inside a folder or swipe down to open the search box.

When you tap on the “Edit” link showing on bottom right corner, it will show additional options for deleting and moving the folders or pages.

Using Favorites in Safari Start Page

Unlike Google Chrome which uses only bookmarks, Safari uses both bookmarks and favorites. It may be confusing as the option for creating a folder is available when adding to bookmark and NOT when adding to favorites. You can consider favorites as one of the folders under bookmarks and you can create a new folder either under favorites or directly under bookmarks section. Though you can select any folder while saving a page, only favorites folders will be shown in the new tab page (called Start Page). The folders created directly under bookmarks section will not be shown in the Start Page. You can tap and hold the favorites folder in Start Page to view the menu from which you can open all the pages or delete the content of entire folder quickly.

If you are not seeing the “Favorites” section in Start Page, scroll down to the bottom of a new tab page and tap “Edit” button. On the pop-up, turn on the switch against “Favorites” options to show the section in your Start Page.

In addition, you can sync the favorites folders using iCloud sync and use on all your devices. For this go to “Settings > Apple ID > iCloud > Show All” and enable “Safari” option.