How to Show the Favorites Bar in Safari

To show the Favorites Bar in Safari on Mac, open the View menu and choose Show Favorites Bar, or press Shift+Cmd+B. A bar with your favorite websites appears just below the toolbar. If it still does not show, you are most likely in full-screen mode, which hides the bar until you exit it.

Show the Favorites Bar from the View menu

The menu route is the clearest and always reflects the current state:

1. Open Safari.
2. Click View in the menu bar at the top of the screen.
3. Choose Show Favorites Bar.

When the bar is already visible, the same menu entry reads Hide Favorites Bar, so you can use it to toggle either way.

Use the keyboard shortcut

If you prefer the keyboard:

1. With Safari open, press Shift+Cmd+B.
2. The Favorites Bar appears below the toolbar.

Pressing Shift+Cmd+B again hides it. This is the quickest method once you remember it.

Fix a Favorites Bar that will not appear

If neither method seems to work, walk through these checks in order:

1. Exit full-screen mode. Full screen hides the Favorites Bar. Press Ctrl+Cmd+F, or move the pointer to the top of the screen and click the green window button to leave full screen.
2. Confirm the bar is enabled. Re-open View and make sure it shows Hide Favorites Bar, which means the bar is on.
3. Look for a chevron. If the bar is on but looks empty, a narrow window may push items behind a chevron at the right end. Click it, or widen the Safari window.

Add and organize sites on the bar

Once the bar is showing, fill it with the sites you reach for most:

1. Open the page you want to save.
2. Drag the address from the smart search field onto the Favorites Bar, or choose Bookmarks then Add Bookmark and save it to the Favorites location.
3. Drag items along the bar to reorder them, and right-click any item to rename or remove it.

Short names fit more sites across the bar, so trimming long titles is worth it if the bar fills up.

Check restrictions if items are still missing

If the bar shows but specific bookmarks are absent, Screen Time content and privacy restrictions can hide or block some sites and bookmarking actions. Open System Settings, go to Screen Time, and review Content & Privacy to see whether web restrictions are turned on for the account in use.

Moving your bookmarks to Chrome later

Safari keeps your Favorites in its own storage on the Mac, separate from other browsers. If you switch to Chrome, you can export your Safari bookmarks to an HTML file and import them. See how to export bookmarks from Safari and how to import bookmarks into Chrome for the full walkthrough.

If Chrome becomes your main browser, TrueBookmark is a Chrome extension that backs up your bookmarks the moment you install it, lets you save a fresh backup in one click, and automatically takes a safety backup before any risky change, so you can restore an earlier version. It does not run in Safari, but it is a sensible safety net to know about once your bookmarks live in Chrome.