The estimated reading time for this post is 4 minutes
Your computer screen is valuable real estate. You only have limited space, and no matter how big your screen is, you want to make the most of what you have. Toolbars, those strips at the top of your screen, take up space so you should use them wisely.
Internet Explorer, Chrome, Firefox and Safari browsers have toolbars where you can add bookmarks to your favorite sites for handy access. Taking a few seconds to save a bookmark to your toolbar can save you valuable time each day as you navigate to your favorite sites in an instant.
Note: Many browsers allow you to add a bookmark by dragging and dropping the website address (also known as the URL) onto the toolbar. To drag and drop, put your cursor (that arrow or flashing bar) on the object you want to move, then click the left button of your mouse (or the button on your mouse for Macs), move the object to where you want it to go, and release the mouse button.
Internet Explorer
Internet Explorer calls bookmarks “Favorites” and designates them with a yellow star. To add a site to your Favorites toolbar, go to the site, then click on the yellow star on the left side of the toolbar.
The bookmark will then appear on your Favorites toolbar. To rearrange your bookmarks on your toolbar, drag and drop them to the desired location.
You can customize the look of your Internet Explorer toolbar by right clicking on the toolbar and then selecting “Customize”. There you can choose the size of the icons and whether you want to include text as a reminder of what the icon represents.
Google Chrome
Saving a bookmark to the Google Chrome toolbar is as easy as dragging and dropping. Put your cursor on the globe to the left of the web address/URL of the site you are on. Click on the left button of the mouse and drag that globe to your toolbar. Let go of the mouse and your bookmark appears.
You can re-position your bookmarks on your Chrome Toolbar by dragging and dropping them.
If you have a lot of bookmarks you want to keep on your toolbar, it’s best to keep them organized. You can create folders of bookmarks by right-clicking the toolbar and selecting Add Folder. You can name your folder with a title such as “Social” and then it will appear on your toolbar. Keep your titles short so you can fit more of them on your toolbar.
You can add a bookmark into a folder by dragging and dropping the bookmark from your toolbar or the web address/URL into the folder. You can rearrange the bookmarks within the folders by dragging and dropping them.
To delete a bookmark, right click on it and select “Delete.”
You can also manage your bookmarks in Chrome by clicking on the wrench icon on the right side of your toolbar and selecting “Bookmarks”. From there you can add, rearrange and rename your bookmarks and folders. You can also hide your bookmarks toolbar if you need to increase the viewing space on your screen.
Firefox
Firefox allows you to add bookmarks to your toolbar by dragging and dropping. Put your cursor on the icon on the left side of the web address/URL and click the left mouse button. Drag the icon to the desired position on your toolbar. You can rearrange the icons by dragging and dropping them.
You can create folders for toolbar bookmarks by right-clicking the toolbar and choosing Add Folder. Name your folder and you can also add a description. Keep your folder title short to maximize the number of bookmarks you can fit in your toolbar.
You can also manage your toolbar bookmarks in Firefox from the Bookmarks button on your toolbar. From this button you can add bookmarks and folders. You can also manage your bookmark toolbar by adding separators.
To hide the bookmarks toolbar, right click on an empty space at the top of the screen and un-check Bookmarks Toolbar.
Safari
To add a bookmark to the Safari bookmark toolbar, drag and drop the icon on the left of the web address/URL onto the toolbar. You can drag and drop to rearrange your bookmarks.
You can also customize the look of your bookmark toolbar in Safari. Click on the settings icon (the icon on the upper right corner of the screen that looks like a gear) and select Customize Toolbar. From there you will open a small window that gives you choices such as adding bookmarks for New Tab, Home, and Top Sites.
From Settings, you can also hide the bookmarks toolbar.
Tech Tip
Make sure to hide or delete any toolbars you aren’t using. You want as much screen space as you can get so if you’re not using a toolbar, get rid of it.
Do you use a bookmark toolbar in your browser? Do you find the bookmark toolbar handy to navigate between your favorite sites? Let us know in the Comments section below!
* Image by Janet Hudson
Informative post Carolyn!
I love bookmarks and use them so-so often! Whenever I come across something I need to keep away for referring to later, or for any other purpose, it’s simply bookmarked into one of my many folders, depending on the niches I have created- and its ideal for a quick reference later.
As I use Chrome, I have that wrench icon on the right hand side of the toolbar, which makes it very convenient to bookmark the pages instantly. I liked your tip in the end, to delete the bookmarks we are not using, something that I often forget doing- though come back to it when I find too many things under one niche 🙂
Thanks for sharing 🙂
I use Opera though [I love it!]. Do you have instructions for Opera?
Hi Lily, Welcome to The Wonder of Tech! Opera is a fantastic browser. To enable the bookmarks toolbar on Opera, click on the Opera tab at the top of the screen to reveal the Menu. Choose Toolbars, then check Bookmarks Bar. You can drag and drop your favorite sites to the toolbar. To hide the toolbar, just uncheck the Bookmarks Bar in Menu.
Thanks for your great question, Lily! 🙂
Do you have any suggestion on the best browser?
Hi Hajra, I think browsers are a matter of personal preference, but I am mostly using Chrome these days. I try to use the four mentioned in this article so I can keep up with them for the blog, but Chrome is my favorite right now. There are so many useful aspects to Chrome I probably should write a post on why I like Chrome so much.
I used to use Firefox, but it has had a lot of problems in the past year so I don’t use it much anymore unless I want to check out something for the blog.
Google Chrome is also my favorite for sure. Not that it is the only one I use, but it is the one that I think are working the best and it have some great features and a lot of extensions you can install too.
Hi Thomas, I’m a big fan of Google Chrome and extensions are a large part of that. I might do an article on extensions someday as they definitely enhance the browsing experience.
Hi Carolyn,
I use Safari and have the Top SItes and Bookmark icon on my toolbar. That seems to work well and I can access the sites I need quickly. Great information – thank you.
Hi Cathy, What I like best about Safari is how well it integrates with my iPhone and iPad. The Reader function is very handy.
Now look at you teaching us how to bookmark young lady. I love your simple explanation of this and I know others will as well.
I must admit, Chrome and FireFox are the only two browsers I use. I hate Internet Explorer and Safari does nothing but lock up on me constantly although it is a cool browser darn it. I use Chrome as my main browser so I don’t really save a lot on FireFox but the drag and drop feature has been a life saver for me. I don’t load mine down though, I only have the bare necessities. The others I put in folders to bookmark and I have a bunch.
Thanks for the easy explanation Carolyn. Great job and I see you are now writing twice a week for the Philadelphia Inquirer? They got lucky snatching you up! 🙂
Hi Adrienne, I’m a big fan of Chrome too. I use bookmarks to help me find sites for images that I happen upon as I hunt for my blog photos. I also have social media sites bookmarked for easy navigation and to help me remember to check in on them frequently.
Carolyn, aloha. WOW! Twice a week in the PI. How lucky the readers are to be receiving your oh-so-informative posts along with the other news that matters to them. congrats, to you, Carolyn.
Yes, I do use bookmarks. However, I do not use them for my day-to-day navigating. If I want to go to a “usual” site, I simply type in a few letters of the URL, click and away I go. That’s fastest for me.
Though I know you use everything under the sun, which is your favorite browser to use and why?
Best wishes for a Terrific Tuesday. Aloha. Janet
Hi Janet, Which browser do you use? Browsers are a matter of personal preference, but I have switched to Chrome in the past year and am really enjoying it. The browsing experience continues to improve so I am sticking with Chrome, having given up Firefox.
So what do you use bookmarks for? I agree with you, sometimes it’s easier to just type a few letters. What’s interesting on Chrome is that I can type “nat” and it suggests your blog site, even though the URL is your name.
Carolyn, aloha. Though I have installed Chrome and used it a few times, because I know Firefox I keep using it despite frustrations. Chrome users seem to love it so I guess I should invest the time to learn it so that it becomes familiar.
For the most part, I bookmark posts or pages that are not regulars for me.
WOW! Love that my blog comes up when you type those few letters. Okay, okay, smart Chrome.
Today I learned about a new tool which may be of interest to you. Miles is “The Web Tools Guy.” He knows about every tool out there and many before they are released.
Web Tool Matches Your Expertise With Questions on Twitter http://twrt.me/x5wj9b
Let me know what you think. Until later, aloha. Janet
I bookmark all the time! And so many of them! Sometimes; I bookmark so often that I forget to catch up and need a whole weekend to check out my bookmarks. I use Google Chrome so bookmarking is right there on the top for me and I find it very easy to click,
Usually, since I came into blogging I have bookmarking much more. Normally, when I really like a post, I bookmark it for getting back to it often. Also, if I can’t think of a comment right away or I get busy with something else, I bookmark it for future, and make it a point to come back and comment later.
Now I know you are thinking “this girl is crazy”; but yes, I bookmark way too much!
Hi Hajra, that sounds like a very effective way to remember which posts you want to re-visit. Just be sure to delete the bookmarks after you don’t need them anymore so your toolbar doesn’t become over-crowded.
I wouldn’t thing you are crazy, Hajra. I would always assume there is a method to your madness! 🙂
Great tips Carolyn,
I’m a huge fan of my Google Chrome bookmarks! I recently came across the feature of creating folders as well. I sorta fell onto that information. I’ve been using Google Chrome for some time now, but hadn’t thought much about reading the other options when I bookmarked a site. Hence the “fell onto the information.” Oops. 😀
I also didn’t know about the dragging and dropping feature! I would simply click the star or the wrench to add my bookmarks.
Thanks for sharing this information! I’m sure this will be handy for a lot of people who aren’t so computer savvy, or who might be like me – and just don’t take the time to notice all of the options available to them. hehe 😉 Great share, Carolyn!
I hope you’re having a wonderful week!
Hi Deeone, Yes, it’s much easier to just drag and drop web addresses to create your bookmarks in Chrome. You can even drop them into folders and place them exactly where you need them.
So far so good this week Deeone. I hope it’s a wonderful week for you too! 🙂
Love bookmarks! I rely on them to help me find my way back days later. Thanks for sharing this so valuable information with everyone.
Hi Carol, Bookmarks are very handy to use so I pay a lot of attention to them. I try to keep the ones I use most often, such as Mr. Rebates, handy on my toolbar without using a folder. But folders are great for organizing your bookmarks as well.
I’m almost never using bookmarks Carolyn. And I’m not sure why, but most of the sites I visit are blogs, and I use Reeder on my Mac and iPad for that. And the other sites I keep visiting are sites I remember. But I should probably use bookmarks, because once in a while there are sites I have completely forgotten about.
I have thought about using delicious, or something similar, so I can get my bookmarks on all my computers and my iPad etc..
Hi Jens, that is interesting that you rarely use bookmarks. You may find them handy, Jens!
Do you know about the glasses icon in Safari that saves sites to Reader?
Yes, I have tested it. And I really like it. But I haven’t used it much, just been testing 🙂
I didn’t use toolbar bookmarks for the longest time even though I’ve already started working online and all that. For some reason I considered bookmarking “stuffing” my browser, I wanted all clean…
But now, I have lots of folders full of bookmarks and every now and then I have to clean them up a little…
Hi Carolyn,
I have tonnes of unorganized bookmarks. I prefer firefox over chrome . Most of the times I use firefox but sometimes a bug might cause me to check the site on chrome.
IE6 is however still used at many corporate companies. I often check my site after modification on my wife’s office machine which has IE6.
Safari is also a cool software .
Thanks for all this info 🙂
Hi Ashvini, You sound like me, using the four main browsers regularly. It’s interesting how many sites look quite different on the various browsers.
Firefox has been buggy for me too for about the past six months. That could be why they are releasing updates so often. 🙂
My bookmarks run so long that even after categorising them into seperate sections, they reach all the way to the bottom with a small arrow pointing downwards indicating that there is STILL MOREEEEEE.
I love to bookmark sites and of course your site is right in my DMC Blogging category 🙂
Hi Praveen, It sounds as if you make good use of your bookmarks! Be sure to eliminate any you feel as if you won’t need to clean up your lists.
Thanks for adding The Wonder of Tech as a bookmark!
Have a great weekend, Praveen!
Hi Carolyn,
Very helpful tips on how to maximize our browser space! And Boy do I know some folks who need to read this!
I have become very careful about how I install new programs onto my computer these days. It seems that so many software devs are “bundling” these types of applications into their software. Yahoo was the first one I noticed doing it with their Instant Messenger installation.
I find that “less is more” these days! 😉
Great read!
Cat Alexandra
Hi Cat, I agree. It drives me nuts when new software adds a toolbar. I prefer to use my screen space efficiently, I don’t want anyone commandeering it!
If I need maximum screen space, I will hide my bookmarks toolbar, but I quickly miss it as I rely on it to help me navigate around the ‘net.
You’re right, less is more, Cat. 🙂
Hi Carolyn,
Apple Spaces is not a bookmarking feature but definitely a screen space saving issue. The ability to jump between different virtual “desktops” that each have their own collection of apps and open folders is an under appreciated feature of the Mac OS. Most people don’t even know it’s there.
Hi Gary, Excellent point! Thanks for sharing this helpful hint. 🙂
i use bookmarks so often that sometimes it is hard to find a bookmarked site from the bookmarks . And yes i manage them using folders.
Hi Faran, Wow, it sounds as if you use a lot of bookmarks! That’s great that you use folders. I try to keep my bookmarks organized in my folders. I will drag and drop them so the ones I use the most are at the top of the list.