Tabs for web browsers have been one of the greatest revolutions in the way you navigate. Until its development, the only way to visit several web pages at the same time was by opening several Internet Explorer windows, or whatever browser it was, doubling the probability that the computer would crash. Thanks to the tabs we can open several web pages within the same window, as long as we do not mind that the consumption of RAM memory is triggered. However, they have been “stagnant” for a long time and do not evolve.
If you look at modern web browsers , the way you use tabs is not much different from how they have been working for more than a decade. Although there have been attempts to improve the functioning of these, none have finished curdling. We seem to be at a standstill. However, this is going to change very soon, as there are browsers that are already experimenting with a new way of conceiving them to navigate.
Google Chrome: groups of tabs for a more organized navigation
One of the novelties that Chrome is testing to improve navigation from its browser are groups of tabs . This feature allows us to group similar tabs within the same group so that we can have them more organized. These groups can be created automatically, or we can create them manually. In addition, we can hide them from groups, or close them, with a single click.
Chrome is also experimenting with a feature to suspend less-used groups of tabs, which will help improve performance and reduce the use of RAM in the browser.
Edge: vertical tabs are finally here
The new Edge Chromium, Microsoft‘s browser, is also experimenting with other features to improve the use of tabs. This browser, in addition to including Google groups, is testing a new bar that will allow us to use them vertically .
This is a feature that has been requested many times, and experimented with in the past, without success. Thanks to it, we can have much more view of the tabs and, as most screens are panoramic, they will allow us to make better use of the horizontal space.
Vivaldi: lashes within lashes in the purest Inception style
The latest version of Vivaldi has shown, to the surprise of many, a new and curious concept to revolutionize web browsing. In it we will be able to open tabs within tabs . This concept is inspired, in a way, by Chrome’s tab groups, with the difference that, instead of grouping them within groups in the same top bar, it does so in a second bar that is created below the browser.
Each tab can have its own sub-bar for the tabs, and everything is fully customizable.
What will the final revolution be?
As we can see, each company has its own experiments. And others, like Mozilla, although they have not yet presented anything, surely they will. All these concepts seem very interesting to us. But the best, from our point of view, are the vertical tabs of Microsoft’s browser.
Now, we know very well that human beings are a being of habit, and changes usually do not usually sit well with them. We will have to wait for all these concepts to continue to take shape and begin to reach all users to see if any of them ends up revolutionizing the way of browsing with tabs.