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iCloud tabs not syncing

CamW222 said:
Whom will I believe? Multiple engineers and senior support specialists at Apple, or a random forum post online? Hmmm...

Edit: I just realized you're the original poster. Look at the time/date stamp of your post. Literally two days after 14.2 came out.
Click to expand...

I seriously doubt you spoke to an Apple engineer. They don’t do end support and don’t interface directly with customers.

“Senior support specialist” is just a title at Apple, like “genius”. It doesn’t really mean anything other than they are higher that tier 1 support which isn’t saying much. Tier 1 support can look up KB articles and also look up internal KB documents, but have no real technical skills. Most senior level specialists also don’t have technical skills (some do, but it’s not a requirement based on my dealings with them). What makes them special is that they can collect data from devices and forward it along to engineers and then take the responses from said engineers and send them along to customers.

As for my post being 2 days after 14.2 came out, while that may be true, there are numerous people in this thread reporting the same problem on devices running iOS versions earlier than that.

Also this problem was fixed for me over a week ago without a software fix. I just tested it again with an iPhone 12 Pro Max and iPad Pro 11 by opening tabs on both devices, going back to the Home Screen and checking iCloud tabs and even deleting tabs from the list. Everything I tried worked. It’s possible it’s still broken for others with a different cause, but as far as I can tell the problem I originally reported is fixed.
 
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Nah it’s not working as normally it should. When it used to work perfectly back then, you opened tabs on one device and they would be available to view on other devices from the iCloud tab list almost instantly. Now it works erratically, which means it’s not working.
 
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Just discovered the arrow-based pull-down menu on the Safari start page (in Big Sur) to choose among other devices. Cool.

I was super excited about this working before, but now performance seems spotty again among my three devices.
 
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It's gotten better for me. Doesn't just disappear for no reason and it's much more quick to sync than in the past. For example, I was looking at a tab downstairs in the parking garage and it's synced up within five minutes. This was the behavior on 14.3 and 14.4.
 
Still not fixed completely for me.
ghost safari iCloud tab groups with integers as sufffix to names continue to show.
screenshot attached.
 

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srbNYC said:
Just discovered the arrow-based pull-down menu on the Safari start page (in Big Sur) to choose among other devices. Cool.

I was super excited about this working before, but now performance seems spotty again among my three devices.
Click to expand...
Right. As I and others have been saying, it might work for some period of time (maybe even a couple of weeks for some!), but then it will break again. Because, unfortunately, it's not fixed.
 
As far as I'm concerned, this issue is FIXED. I hope Apple stops fussing with it and reallocates dev resources to deal with more important issues/projects
 
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hoodafoo said:
As far as I'm concerned, this issue is FIXED. I hope Apple stops fussing with it and reallocates dev resources to deal with more important issues/projects
Click to expand...

Yet somehow, I get the feeling that if this issue was affecting you and not others you would be screaming and shouting from the rooftops for Apple to fix it? But that would be different right, if it was affecting you?
 
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StumpyBloke said:
Yet somehow, I get the feeling that if this issue was affecting you and not others you would be screaming and shouting from the rooftops for Apple to fix it? But that would be different right, if it was affecting you?
Click to expand...
I don't think so... I'd be smart enough to know what if the issue is resolved for 99% of the community and I still have the issue, the problem lies with ME. You can't expect ANY company to account for the billions of different configs/scenarios out there. I'm willing to bet the farm that your iCloud Tabs would be sorted out if you clean installed your devices and established a new Apple ID
 
hoodafoo said:
As far as I'm concerned, this issue is FIXED. I hope Apple stops fussing with it and reallocates dev resources to deal with more important issues/projects
Click to expand...
So when you open a tab on a device, it will show up instantly on your other devices? And it work everytime without you having to do some workaround? And just to make sure, you’re not talking about Safari Handoff feature, right? If so, congrats. If not, then the issue’s not fixed.
 
realpras said:
So when you open a tab on a device, it will show up instantly on your other devices? And it work everytime without you having to do some workaround? And just to make sure, you’re not talking about Safari Handoff feature, right? If so, congrats. If not, then the issue’s not fixed.
Click to expand...

Tabs have never showed up instantly on other devices. It has always required exiting Safari before the tabs show up on other devices. For me that was fixed a few weeks ago.
 
Morac said:
Tabs have never showed up instantly on other devices. It has always required exiting Safari before the tabs show up on other devices. For me that was fixed a few weeks ago.
Click to expand...
Since it hasn’t been working for ages now, I can’t confirm whether you’re right, that tabs never showed up instantly and require exiting Safari, or not.

But I’m pretty sure I could just deliberately open tabs on my iPhone to continue browsing on my Mac, without thinking “oh I must exit Safari first. Let me do that!” or “Why are the tabs not showing? Oh yea I forgot to exit Safari on my other device!”

Tried to find it in action on YouTube:
2 years ago:
8 years ago (when it was still in beta on iOS6):
Seems to me you don’t actually need to exit Safari to make them sync. You can be in the middle of browsing and the tabs will show up on other devices (maybe not as instantly as a matter of seconds, but definitely a seamless process, ie not requiring exiting Safari)
 
realpras said:
Since it hasn’t been working for ages now, I can’t confirm whether you’re right, that tabs never showed up instantly and require exiting Safari, or not.

But I’m pretty sure I could just deliberately open tabs on my iPhone to continue browsing on my Mac, without thinking “oh I must exit Safari first. Let me do that!” or “Why are the tabs not showing? Oh yea I forgot to exit Safari on my other device!”

Tried to find it in action on YouTube:
2 years ago:
8 years ago (when it was still in beta on iOS6):
Seems to me you don’t actually need to exit Safari to make them sync. You can be in the middle of browsing and the tabs will show up on other devices (maybe not as instantly as a matter of seconds, but definitely a seamless process, ie not requiring exiting Safari)
Click to expand...

I watched both videos.

In the one from 2 years ago, the person never actually opened a new tab and then checked the iCloud tab list, so there’s no way to tell how long it was sitting there before the tabs updated. Also the person was using an emulator.

In the one from 8 years ago, it took 5 minutes for the tabs to sync according to the person in the video.

Neither of those was “instantaneous”. If you need instantaneous access to tabs on another device when Safari is open on that tab, that’s what handover is for. iCloud tabs is for when you need access to tabs on another device when not using said device, for example when you go out and need to access those tabs on your iPhone.
 
CamW222 said:
You don’t know what you’re talking about, honestly, and are coming across as a self absorbed jerk. You should probably stop here, but I know from experience that your type rarely does.
Click to expand...
Please chill for everyone's benefit. We all prefer when reading here is pleasant. Thank you.
 
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Morac said:
I watched both videos.

In the one from 2 years ago, the person never actually opened a new tab and then checked the iCloud tab list, so there’s no way to tell how long it was sitting there before the tabs updated. Also the person was using an emulator.

In the one from 8 years ago, it took 5 minutes for the tabs to sync according to the person in the video.

Neither of those was “instantaneous”. If you need instantaneous access to tabs on another device when Safari is open on that tab, that’s what handover is for. iCloud tabs is for when you need access to tabs on another device when not using said device, for example when you go out and need to access those tabs on your iPhone.
Click to expand...
Mine is instantaneous, but if you're happy with closing your browser to get to to work, more power to you
 
srbNYC said:
Please chill for everyone's benefit. We all prefer when reading here is pleasant. Thank you.
Click to expand...
Basically the person to whom I was responding said, "It's not a problem for me, so it's not a problem." If you think that kind of behavior here is conducive to good and helpful discussion, more power to you.

It was wrong on a number of levels. 1) The problem was widespread, and while *some* users report things working again, some of those same users and others - even in this very thread - are saying that the problem remains or recurs. This is not some tiny sample of people in a population of many millions. 2) It assumes that I am running some kind of special configuration or that I *haven't* already tried re-installing from scratch on my devices. I have. I am guessing others have as well, and yet the problem remains.

So yes, the statement was highly presumptuous, unhelpful, and more than a little self-centered. I appreciate your interest in maintaining a "chill" discussion space. But if that is your priority, I would suggest you turn your attention to the individual who jumped into this thread to say, basically, that this thread is pointless and that people who are still having a problem should just suck it up. Thank you.
 
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realpras said:
Since it hasn’t been working for ages now, I can’t confirm whether you’re right, that tabs never showed up instantly and require exiting Safari, or not.

But I’m pretty sure I could just deliberately open tabs on my iPhone to continue browsing on my Mac, without thinking “oh I must exit Safari first. Let me do that!” or “Why are the tabs not showing? Oh yea I forgot to exit Safari on my other device!”

Tried to find it in action on YouTube:
2 years ago:
8 years ago (when it was still in beta on iOS6):
Seems to me you don’t actually need to exit Safari to make them sync. You can be in the middle of browsing and the tabs will show up on other devices (maybe not as instantly as a matter of seconds, but definitely a seamless process, ie not requiring exiting Safari)
Click to expand...
I think morac is correct here, just based on the logic of how people would tend to use this feature. Those wanting instantaneous transfer would use handoff. iCloud tabs are important for people who are resuming browsing at a later time after some interval, which would imply either closing safari on a mobile device, or having the page loaded on a desktop safari browser for more than a minute or two.
 
I don't have to exit Safari for it to work, but it's not just instantaneous either - certain events trigger it. I am ok with how it works though. Here is what I just did to demonstrate that, starting from iPhone/Safari = no tabs up, and I am using my MacBook Pro:

1. On iPhone, bring up Safari. Open Google Maps in a tab.
2. Check iCloud tabs on MacBook Pro - does not show any tabs for iPhone
3. Minimize Safari on iPhone
4. Google Maps tab shows instantly on MacBook Pro
5. Bring up safari again on iPhone, add second tab - Macrumors
6. Check MacBook Pro - only Google Maps shows
7. Minimize Safari on iPhone
8. MacBook Pro shows two tabs on iPhone, Maps and Macrumors

here's an interesting one:

9. Bring up Safari on iPhone again, change Macrumors tab to Wall St. Journal
10. Check MacBook Pro - still shows two tabs on iPhone, Maps and Macrumors
11. Hit sleep button on iPhone without minimizing Safari
12. MacBook Pro now shows Maps and WSJ

or this----

13. Add tab to iPhone Safari - Amazon
14. Check MacBook Pro - no changes
15. Swipe up slowly, as if to swipe up and kill the app - but just tap on another open app
16. Check MacBook Pro - now shows additional Amazon app

So certain events/actions trigger the update of iCloud tabs, which makes sense to me - it seems this would be a performance/power/resource issue if every time a tab changed/updated/added/deleted Safari immediately updated iCloud? I find I can almost guess the types of transition events that cause iCloud tabs to update.
 
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I just wanted to say this for me, I’m the past, when it worked seamlessly, it was instant. You close a tab on your iPhone, it disappears from your Mac. You close that iPhone tab from your Mac, and that tab disappeared from my iPhone Safari browser.

Now it is different. Prior to Big Sur, among iOS 13 and Catalina it still worked but since I installed Big Sur, no syncing anymore. It doesn’t even show any iCloud tabs.

Do you think this problem is related to the operating system? Or is it a system side issue?
 
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