Google Gives Users Ability To Instantly Nuke The Last 15 Minutes Of Searches

by Brandon Hill — Friday, July 16, 2021, 12:33 PM EDT

Do you often find yourself searching for questionable content that you wish could be quickly deleted from your device's history to avoid inevitable embarrassment? Google apparently agrees that there's a need and is enabling a new option for a select group of users.

This new "Quick Delete" feature was first mentioned at Google I/O, and allows you to eradicate the last 15 minutes' worth of searches by tapping just one button. This is a more immediate option than Google's existing automatic search history deletion options, which currently defaults to 18 months. There are also existing options to automatically delete your search history along with Web & App Activity after three months or 36 months.

While this is a nifty feature to have to cover your digital breadcrumbs instantly, it's limited in availability at this time. For now, only iOS users that have the Google app installed have access to the 15-minute search timebomb. Google says that the feature will roll out to the Android Google app before the close of 2021. There is no indication of the timeframe for a rollout of the 15-minute deletion option for desktop users.

"Maybe you share a device and want to make sure others who use it can't go into My Activity and look at your Search history," writes Google Search Product Manager JK Kearns. "We're deeply committed to making sure you can do that safely, and with the privacy you expect."

Of course, you can always go in and manually delete any offending searches from your history, but that can be time-consuming depending on how voracious your activities were. Still, we're happy to see Google give users another option to keep private information locked down; even the initial rollout isn't as expansive as we would have hoped.

Tags: Google, (nasdaq:goog), google search

Brandon Hill

Brandon received his first PC, an IBM Aptiva 310, in 1994 and hasn’t looked back since. He cut his teeth on computer building/repair working at a mom and pop computer shop as a plucky teen in the mid 90s and went on to join AnandTech as the Senior News Editor in 1999. Brandon would later help to form DailyTech where he served as Editor-in-Chief from 2008 until 2014. Brandon is a tech geek at heart, and family members always know where to turn when they need free tech support. When he isn’t writing about the tech hardware or studying up on the latest in mobile gadgets, you’ll find him browsing forums that cater to his long-running passion: automobiles.

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