How to Clear Cookies in Microsoft Edge (And What You Should Know First)
Cookies are small data files that websites store in your browser to remember your preferences, keep you logged in, and track your activity across sessions. Over time, these files accumulate — and clearing them can solve login problems, fix broken page behavior, protect your privacy, or simply free up a bit of storage. Microsoft Edge gives you several ways to do this, each suited to different situations.
What Cookies Actually Do in Edge
When you visit a site in Edge, the server can place a cookie on your device. That cookie might store your login session, your language preference, items in a shopping cart, or tracking identifiers used by advertisers. Edge holds these files in a dedicated browser cache tied to your profile.
First-party cookies come from the site you're visiting directly. Third-party cookies come from other domains embedded in that page — typically ad networks or analytics services. Edge treats these differently, and that distinction matters when you're deciding what to clear.
How to Clear All Cookies in Edge 🍪
The most straightforward method clears cookies across all sites at once.
- Open Microsoft Edge
- Click the three-dot menu (…) in the top-right corner
- Select Settings
- Go to Privacy, search, and services
- Under Clear browsing data, click Choose what to clear
- Check Cookies and other site data
- Choose your time range (Last hour, Last 24 hours, Last 7 days, Last 4 weeks, or All time)
- Click Clear now
You can also reach this screen directly with the keyboard shortcut Ctrl + Shift + Delete on Windows, or Cmd + Shift + Delete on Mac.
What the Time Range Setting Affects
Choosing a shorter time range only removes cookies set during that window. If a persistent login cookie was placed six months ago and you only clear the last hour, that session stays intact. For a full reset, All time is the setting that removes everything.
How to Clear Cookies for a Single Website
Sometimes you only want to remove cookies from one specific site — without affecting your saved sessions elsewhere. Edge handles this through site permissions.
- Visit the site in question, or type its address in the URL bar
- Click the padlock icon (or information icon) on the left side of the address bar
- Select Cookies and site data
- You'll see the cookies currently stored for that site
- Click the trash icon next to individual entries, or Remove all for that domain
This approach is useful when a single site is misbehaving — showing outdated content, refusing to log you out, or throwing persistent errors — without disrupting your experience everywhere else.
Clearing Cookies in Edge on Mobile
On iOS and Android, the process follows a slightly different path:
- Tap the three-dot menu at the bottom (iOS) or top-right (Android)
- Select Settings
- Tap Privacy and security
- Tap Clear browsing data
- Make sure Cookies and site data is selected
- Tap Clear data
Mobile Edge doesn't offer per-site cookie deletion with the same granularity as the desktop version, though the InPrivate mode prevents cookies from being saved in the first place.
Scheduled and Automatic Cookie Clearing
Edge includes a feature called Clear browsing data on close, which automatically removes selected data types — including cookies — every time the browser shuts down.
To enable it:
- Go to Settings → Privacy, search, and services
- Scroll to Clear browsing data
- Toggle on Choose what to clear every time you close the browser
- Enable Cookies and other site data
This is useful for shared computers or anyone who prefers not to maintain persistent sessions. The trade-off is that you'll be logged out of every site each time you close the browser.
The Variables That Change the Right Approach 🔒
Clearing cookies isn't a single universal action — the right method depends on several factors:
| Variable | How It Changes the Approach |
|---|---|
| Shared vs. personal device | Shared devices benefit from automatic clearing; personal devices may not |
| Logged-in accounts | Clearing all cookies logs you out of everything simultaneously |
| Site-specific issues | Per-site deletion is less disruptive than a full clear |
| Privacy goals | Blocking third-party cookies may accomplish more than manual clearing |
| Sync settings | If Edge syncs across devices, clearing on one device may not affect others |
| InPrivate usage | Cookies from InPrivate sessions are never saved to begin with |
Edge also has a Tracking prevention feature (under Privacy, search, and services) that blocks third-party cookies from known trackers automatically — a different lever from manual clearing, but one that affects what gets stored in the first place.
What Clearing Cookies Won't Fix
It's worth knowing the limits. Clearing cookies removes stored session data, but it doesn't:
- Remove browser cache (images, scripts, page files — cleared separately)
- Delete your browsing history
- Remove saved passwords
- Block future cookies from being set
- Remove data the website itself has stored server-side
If you're troubleshooting a persistent issue, you may need to clear cached images and files alongside cookies, or check whether an extension is interfering with the page.
How Edge Profiles Affect Cookie Storage
Edge supports multiple browser profiles, each with its own separate cookie store, history, and saved data. If you use Edge with both a personal and work profile, clearing cookies in one profile has no effect on the other. Anyone managing multiple profiles needs to repeat the process for each one — or check which profile the problem site is associated with before troubleshooting.
How aggressively you should clear cookies — and how often — depends heavily on what you're trying to accomplish, how many devices you use, and how much you rely on persistent logins day to day.