Complete guide for macOS, iPhone, and iPad — including how to enable Web Inspector and override your UA
First enable the Develop menu: go to Safari → Settings → Advanced → check 'Show features for web developers'. Then open the Web Inspector with Cmd+Option+I, click the Console tab, and type navigator.userAgent.
Unlike Chrome, Safari hides developer tools by default. You need to enable them once before you can access the Web Inspector or Console.
Click Safari in the menu bar → Settings (or Preferences on older macOS)
Safari's Develop menu includes built-in UA switching — no extensions needed. This is useful for testing how websites serve different content based on browser identity.
Choose a preset (Chrome, Firefox, Edge, etc.) or select "Other…" for a custom string
The override persists until you change it back or close the tab. Select "Default" to restore your original user agent.
iOS Safari doesn't have a built-in console, but there are two reliable methods:
Simply visit an online user agent checker on your iPhone or iPad:
On your iPhone/iPad: Settings → Safari → Advanced → Web Inspector: ON
Connect your device to your Mac via USB cable
On your Mac: Open Safari, click Develop in the menu bar
Your device name appears — hover over it and select the open page
A Web Inspector window opens — use the Console to type navigator.userAgent
First enable the Develop menu: go to Safari → Settings → Advanced → check 'Show features for web developers'. Then open the Web Inspector with Cmd+Option+I, click the Console tab, and type navigator.userAgent.
Go to Safari menu → Settings (or Preferences) → Advanced tab → check 'Show features for web developers' (older versions: 'Show Develop menu in menu bar'). This enables the Develop menu and Web Inspector.
A typical Safari UA string is: Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 14_2) AppleWebKit/605.1.15 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/17.2 Safari/605.1.15. The Version/ token shows the actual Safari version.
The easiest way is to visit an online tool like SnapWhatIsMy.com. For developers, connect your iPhone/iPad to a Mac via USB, enable Web Inspector in iOS Settings → Safari → Advanced, then use Safari's Develop menu on Mac to inspect the device.
Yes. With the Develop menu enabled, go to Develop → User Agent and choose from presets (Chrome, Firefox, etc.) or select 'Other…' to enter a custom string. On iOS, there's no built-in way to change the UA without a Mac.
Safari's UA string includes 'KHTML, like Gecko' for historical compatibility — early web servers would block unknown browsers. The 'AppleWebKit' token is genuine (Safari's rendering engine), while the compatibility tokens ensure older websites serve the correct content.
No. As of 2026, Safari does not support the User-Agent Client Hints API (navigator.userAgentData). Apple has expressed privacy concerns about the specification. For Safari, you must still rely on the traditional navigator.userAgent string or feature detection.