It is without a doubt that incognito mode has made our lives a whole lot better. It allows you to browse the internet without having to stress about your internet activity being tracked and your privacy being exposed. Incognito mode was first introduced in 2005 by the Apple Safari browser. Three years later, Google Chrome introduced this feature in its browser. Since then it has become available in almost all modern browsers.

As we live in a time where it has become incredibly easy to track someone, you must learn more about incognito mode and how you can activate it in the most used browser which is Google Chrome. Once you know how to activate the private mode in Google Chrome, you should be able to activate it on all other browsers (i.e. Firefox, Edge, etc.). To give you a quick heads-up, one of the major benefits of private browsing is that it can protect you against cookie-based trackings since the current session is erased when you close the browser. So, what are you waiting for? Let’s dive into the article right in.

Google Chrome’s Incognito Mode

In the simplest of words, the incognito mode in Google Chrome has been created to help you browse online without having to worry about your browsing habits being tracked. The reason why incognito mode is provided is that it ensures your browsing history does not get saved between sessions (the time you continuously browsed the internet without closing the browser window). This means that it does not store any cookies and cache when you close the current window. At this point when you open the browser again, the cookies, history, and other metrics are fresh and have no information stored in them. However, the only thing that is remaining unchanged between your sessions is your IP (an internet address that identifies a device on the internet and is unique for each user). Therefore, websites can track you with your IP address even if you were browsing with a private browser (or incognito mode). To solve this bottleneck, you will need to install a VPN (a virtual private network). With a VPN, you can change your IP to a different one (depending on your choice) and skip away from being tracked with a fixed IP address. In summary, since incognito mode would not be able to fully prevent you from getting tracked online by a third party, and for greater protection, use a VPN to hide your real IP address.

How You Can Activate the Incognito Mode In Google Chrome?

If you are looking for the quickest way to use incognito mode in Google Chrome, you just need to press (Ctrl, Shift, and N) for Windows or (Command, Shift, and N) for Mac. It should open a new window that you can use to browse the internet without having to worry about privacy issues. Otherwise, you can utilize the interface (the three dots on the top right corner of the browser) for activating incognito mode.

As mentioned above, to activate incognito mode through the interface, you would have to click the three dots which are located at the far right, and select “New Incognito window”. The best thing about Google Chrome is that it even lets you set the incognito mode as default. This means that an incognito window would open up whenever you use Google Chrome. It does not get better than this. You will come across the message “You Are Viewing in Incognito Mode” when you launch an incognito mode window.

When you use incognito mode, the top right part of Google Chrome would be visible. As mentioned earlier, please keep in mind that incognito mode would not fully prevent tracking. All it would do is prevent the browsing history, cache, cookie, etc. from getting saved between sessions. This means that the website you visit, the ISP, and the network administrator would be able to identify you based on these metrics. The next step is to use a VPN to strengthen your privacy.

Now that you learn how to turn on the incognito mode in Google Chrome, please take a look at other browsers such as Firefox, Edge, and Opera browsers and try to locate the incognito menu or keyboard shortcuts. In some occasions or places, Google Chrome may not be available and you may need to use other browsers. So it is a good idea to check the Incognito mode availability in those browsers and learn how to open it quickly.

Conclusion

After you have gone over the post, you will know how to activate incognito mode in Google Chrome. You must also use a VPN for extending security and privacy. Using a VPN and private browsing at the same time, allows you to browse the internet in an unsafer environment with public WiFi (i.e. restaurants, stores, etc.).