Sometimes you might be asked to clear your browser cache to correct an issue or view the latest page of a website.
Why Clear your Cache?
Each browser keeps a copy each website page as you visit it. It then gives you this page then next time you visit that site to speed up your browsing experience. It then periodically gets the last version of that page but there are times you need to force it to get the latest version without waitng. That is when you need to clear your cache.
How to clear your cache in your browser
Clearing the cache is different for each browser, but practically all of them have a cache clearing option in their options or settings. Here are some instructions for the main browsers:
Chrome:
- Settings (three dots)
- More Tools
- Clear Browsing Data
Firefox:
- Menu (hamburger)
- Options
- Advanced
- Network
- Cached Web Content
- Clear Now
Safari:
- Options
- Reset Safari
- Remove All Website Data
Edge:
- Options (three dots)
- Settings
- Clear Browsing Data
See http://packard-bell-scandic.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/38047/~/microsoft-edge%3A-how-to-clear-browser-history-and-cache for more information on MS Edge
Or try Refreshing the page
If you only want to load a page bypassing cache then simply refresh the page. The page will reload without using the cached files. Please note: This doesn’t clear the browser cache. You can do this with a soft refresh or a hard refresh.
Soft Refresh
If you click on the refresh/reload button or press the F5 or Ctrl+R hotkey on your web browser, this will trigger a “soft refresh” on the web browser where it will check against the web server to see if the files are modified. If modified, the web browser will pull the latest version of the file and if not modified, the web browser will continue to use the cache version.
Read More: https://www.raymond.cc/blog/refresh-webpage-with-soft-or-hard-reload-in-web-browsers/
Hard Refresh
As for hard refresh, it is a method to force the web browser to fetch all of the files again ignoring the expiration time and bypassing the local cache.
Read More: https://www.raymond.cc/blog/refresh-webpage-with-soft-or-hard-reload-in-web-browsers/
Soft refresh webpage: Click on the Reload/Refresh button or press the F5 key (PC) or Command+R (Mac) on keyboard.
Hard refresh webpage: press the Ctrl+F5 key (PC) or Command+Shift+R (Mac) on keyboard.
← Support