Safari sidebar bookmark order and drag-and-drop issue on MacBook Pro with Sequoia 15.7

I came here looking for an answer to the same problem, then figured it out:

• Click the "..." menu in the sidebar
• Sort By -> None

Mine had somehow become set to Date Added. When I set it to None, I could drag to reorder again.

It would be nice if there were some more obvious clue that this is what's happening; maybe if you're dragging while there's a sort in place, there would be a tooltip saying "Sorted by Date Added" or the like.

Really, it should perhaps be Sort By -> Sort Manually or something; there's always some sort happening. And there should probably be a group divider between that first option and the automatic options, like there is between the sort methods and ordering options.

One other thing: There are also Sort By options (slightly different options, natch) when you are in Bookmarks -> Edit Bookmarks; however, those do a one-time "data sort" rather than a "display sort" like the sidebar has.

Really really I have no idea why I would ever want to sort my sidebar differently than the ordering that is in my Bookmarks proper and I think having two kinds of sorts for bookmarks that work differently in different views is super confusing but I don't get to decide.

Anyhow though 90% sure a display sort is that's what's biting you.

Nathan Vack wrote:

• I came here looking for an answer to the same problem, then figured it out:

Click the "..." menu in the sidebar

• Sort By -> None

for those on Tahoe, that is the fix. but for those of us on sequoia, (like the OP here) the "three dots" menu is not present, so that doesn't work for us.

but along with laying a new sequoia over the old one, there is a newer development.

if you cannot (or don’t want to) upgrade to Tahoe, you have another option.

you may want to look at 6x6's reply in this discussion. if you are comfortable using terminal, their suggestion fixes things for those of us on sequoia with safari 26.1.

please note, if you are going to try the terminal commands, you need to grant terminal full disk access. go to System Settings > Privacy & Security > Full Disk Access to do so.

For those of us on Sequoia, and unhappy with safari 26, you might want to look at FitzltEng’s reply in this thread. You can lay Sequoia in place over the Sequoia with safari 26.0.1 to end up back on Sequoia with safari 18.6 without a system wipe and reinstall.

I cannot upgrade to Tahoe, so I have no idea if that step will work on Tahoe. But if it won’t work on Tahoe, then you may still want to provide feedback to apple.

Please see Feedback - Safari - Apple.

UPDATE:

Thanks to brian mck for pointing this out:  

on sequoia, You can use Apple Menu > Safari > Bookmarks and choose “Edit Bookmarks”. Then you can drag and drop bookmarks there to rearrange them.

Apparently that option has been there over many versions of safari.

[Edited by Moderator]

did you lay the new sequoia over the old one? or did you do a full erase and reinstall?

credit also needs to go to Allan Jones.

Yes, this works but if you have Sequoia and Safari 26, the bookmarks sidebar does not show the reordering when you go to that folder location via sidebar.