Sessions and privacy

Incognito, containers, and knowing exactly what a site left behind

Isolation is per tab, at the website-data level. A normal tab, a persistent container, and an in-memory incognito tab each get their own data store, and a new tab inherits whatever session you were in.

Things to try

about 7 minutes

01Open an incognito tab.⌥⇧⌘NIts data store is memory only. It never persists and never syncs.
02From the folder button above the sidebar, make a container, then open a tab in it.Containers persist. Sign into the same site in two containers and you are two different people to it.
03Turn the tab you are on into an incognito tab.⌥⇧⌘IYour logins come along because cookies are copied over, but everything after the switch is memory only. Enable it in Settings, Privacy first.
04Clear the current site's data without touching anything else.⇧⌘EThe Privacy menu also clears the whole session, or everything.
05Open the cookie manager in Settings, Privacy and read one cookie in full.Domain, path, expiry, and value, with per-cookie deletion.
06In the same pane, look at the list of sites that left a sign-in cookie behind.Signing out there deletes that site's cookies, caches, and storage in that session.
07Grant a site camera access, then find the saved choice and revoke it.Private tabs never add an entry here.
08In Settings, Security, toggle ad and tracker blocking and reload a heavy site.The same pane holds strict SSL, which refuses invalid certificates outright.

Worth filming

Two containers signed into the same site as two different accounts, side by side in a split.

Settings panes behind this chapter: Privacy, Security.