What is SearchOptical?

SearchOptical is yet another browser hijacker that may infiltrate your device by means of freeware programs or fake updaters. It’s not a virus and in fact, can’t harm your system, its presence on your device will only reduce your browsing experience. Once installed, browser hijacker injects ads into your browsers so that you will see diverse commercial content each time you browse the Internet. Banners, coupons, video/audio ads, best deals, in-text hyperlinks, all this will prevent you from viewing webpages. The new search engine installed by the hijacker is not trustworthy as well. It is worth noting that SearchOptical removal is not an easy task since it makes a lot of adjustments to the system configuration and also creates many additional files to be able to reinstall itself. In this case, we advise using proper anti-malware program that will uninstall SearchOptical automatically.

Recommended Anti-malware tools:

The easiest and most modern way of removing hijackers, pop-ups, Trojans, ransomware or other viruses is to use automatic removal tools. See our Anti-malware tools below for further instructions.

Also, you can try to remove SearchOptical manually.

Alternative solution. Step 1: Remove SearchOptical from Mac

SearchOptical may not have the app associated with it in Applications. However, we recommend you to inspect the list of installed applications and remove unknown or suspicious ones. Look for SearchOptical or SearchOptical.app.

Mac OSX:

1. Open Finder
2. In the Finder sidebar, click Applications
3. If you see Uninstall SearchOptical or SearchOptical Uninstaller, double-click it and follow instructions
4. Drag unwanted application SearchOptical from the Applications folder to the Trash (located on the right side of the Dock)

Learn more about uninstallation of programs in Mac OSX

Step 2: Remove malicious entries from Profiles (Mac)

1. Open System Preferences.
2. Click on Profiles.
3. Click on unsigned and suspicious profiles on the left panel.
4. Click the minus button below to delete rogue settings.

Step 3: Get rid of SearchOptical using Terminal (only for Google Chrome)

1. Open Terminal
2. Copy and paste the following entries one by one each time by pressing “ENTER”:
   defaults write com.google.Chrome HomepageIsNewTabPage -bool false
   defaults write com.google.Chrome NewTabPageLocation -string “https://www.google.com/”
   defaults write com.google.Chrome HomepageLocation -string “https://www.google.com/”
   defaults delete com.google.Chrome DefaultSearchProviderSearchURL
   defaults delete com.google.Chrome DefaultSearchProviderNewTabURL
   defaults delete com.google.Chrome DefaultSearchProviderName
3. Relaunch Chrome

Step 4: Delete SearchOptical from browsers

Safari:

1. Open Safari
2. Click Safari menu.
3. Choose Extensions.
4. Find SearchOptical or other suspicious extensions.
5. Click Uninstall button to remove it.

Learn more about removing extensions from Safari.

Google Chrome:

1. Open Google Chrome
2. Click the Chrome menu (3-dots icon) in the top right corner.
3. Click Tools.
4. Choose Extensions.
5. Find SearchOptical or other suspicious extensions.
6. Click the trash can icon to remove it.

Learn more about removing extensions from Chrome.

Mozilla Firefox:

1. Open Firefox.
2. Push Shift + Ctrl + A.
3. Choose SearchOptical or other suspicious extensions.
4. Click Disable or Remove button.

Learn more about removing extensions from Firefox.

Step 5: Resetting your browser search and homepage settings

Reset browser setting in Safari:

1. Open Safari.
2. Click on the Safari menu.
3. Choose Reset Safari….
4. Click Reset button.

Learn more about resetting browser settings in Safari.

Reset browser setting in Google Chrome:

1. Click the Chrome menu (3 bar button) in the top right corner.
2. Choose Settings.
3. Click Show advanced settings.
4. Go to Reset browser settings section.
5. Click Reset browser settings.
6. In the dialog that appears, click Reset.

Learn more about resetting browser settings in Google Chrome.

Reset browser setting in Mozilla Firefox:

1. Open Mozilla Firefox.
2. Go to Help.
3. Go to Troubleshooting information.
4. Click Reset Firefox… button.

Learn more about resetting browser settings in Mozilla Firefox.