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Chrome tab manager for developers

You have a dozen coloured Chrome tab groups open at once, one per pull request across three repositories: the red group holds the PR diff and the CI logs, the blue group is the API docs page plus two Stack Overflow answers, the green group is the local reproduction and the linked issue thread. A Chrome tab manager for developers has to treat each of those groups as a code-review context, because the moment a production incident pulls you off this feature you close the window — and next sprint, when the bug report on that same PR lands, you are rebuilding the whole working set from memory and a half-remembered search. Chrome's own reopen brings back recent tabs but forgets which group each belonged to, so you get a flat strip instead of the per-PR grouping you built. Tabwell snapshots the whole window with each tab's group assignment — group name, colour, and collapsed state read through the chrome.tabGroups API — and writes them all back on restore, so a finished review is one click away from coming back exactly as you left it. The record lives in local IndexedDB on your device, so an editor crash or a Chrome update never scatters the context.

The developer's working set is the per-PR groups, not the tabs

When you carry several pull requests at once, the unit of work is the coloured group, not the individual tab. The red group is one PR's diff and CI run, the blue group is the docs and the answers you leaned on, the green group is the reproduction and the issue. Lose the grouping and you have not lost fifteen tabs — you have lost the map that told you which page belonged to which review. That is why tab organization for programmers has to preserve group structure to be worth anything, and why Chrome's flat reopen leaves you reassembling each context by hand.

How Tabwell maps onto a multi-repo workflow

Tabwell fits the way you already track work across repositories rather than asking you to move into a new system:

  • Snapshot each per-PR or per-issue group with full fidelity. A snapshot is a JSON record of each window, each tab's title and URL, and each tab's group assignment with the group name, colour, and collapsed flag. Restore rebuilds those groups through chrome.tabGroups, so a code-review context comes back in the same colour and collapsed exactly as you left it.
  • Full-text search over saved tab titles and URLs to surface an old review. Pro indexes the title and URL of every saved tab, so you can type a ticket id like PROJ-1428, a repository name, or a docs domain and jump to the snapshot that held that PR three weeks ago. It is a literal substring match over titles and URLs — it does not read page contents and the tab does not need to be open.
  • Archive a finished feature, restore it when the bug lands. When a PR merges, keep its snapshot; weeks later, when a regression report names that feature, restore the one snapshot to bring the diff, the CI logs, and the issue thread back as a group instead of hunting them down again.

Find a review from three weeks ago

The recurring developer problem is not saving the tabs, it is finding the right saved set later. Chrome's address bar searches open tabs and history, not the sessions you archived after a context switch. Tabwell's full-text search runs across every saved snapshot, so one keyword reaches a PR you closed a sprint ago. The companion guide on a Chrome tab manager with search covers what the index matches, the guide on saving tab groups in Chrome covers capturing a group's colour and collapsed state, and the guide on restoring Chrome tabs after a crash walks the restore flow. This page does not re-teach those steps; it shows why they matter when each group is a review in flight.

Free vs Pro for a developer workload

Every install from the Chrome Web Store starts with a 14-day Pro trial, no credit card. After it, the Free tier keeps your latest 5 snapshots with manual save and restore, JSON export for backup, and a 60-minute auto-snapshot. A developer juggling many open PRs usually wants more history than five snapshots, plus a way to search them: Pro lifts the cap to unlimited, adds full-text search across every saved tab's title and URL, and tightens the auto-snapshot to every 5 minutes. Pricing is $3.99/month, $29/year, $59 one-time, or $19 one-time for the first 1,000 Founders buyers, with a 30-day refund.

FAQ

Do my coloured tab groups survive a restore?

Yes. A snapshot stores each tab's group assignment with the group name, colour, and collapsed state, read through the chrome.tabGroups API. On restore Tabwell rebuilds those groups rather than dropping every tab into a flat list, so a per-PR group comes back in its original colour and collapsed. This is the difference from Chrome's native reopen, which forgets group membership.

Can I find a saved PR review from weeks ago by keyword?

Yes, with Pro. Tabwell indexes the title and URL of every saved tab for full-text search, so a ticket id, repository name, or docs domain matches the snapshot that held that review. It is a literal substring match over titles and URLs, not a search of page contents, and the tab does not need to be open. On the Free tier only the latest 5 snapshots are kept and search is not included.

Does Tabwell handle several windows and repositories open at once?

Yes. A single snapshot captures every open window with all of its coloured groups, so the PRs you have open across three repositories are saved together. You can restore the whole working set at once, or archive one feature's snapshot and restore it on its own later. Each restore rebuilds the original window layout and tab groups.

Can I archive a finished feature and reopen it when the bug returns?

Yes. Keep the snapshot when a PR merges, then restore that single snapshot later to bring back the diff, CI logs, docs, and issue thread as a group. Pro keeps unlimited snapshots, so archived features do not push out recent work. On the Free tier only the latest 5 snapshots are retained.

Where are my saved sessions stored, and do they leave my device?

Snapshots are stored locally in IndexedDB on your device via dexie. Tab URLs and titles never leave the device; the only network call is to Polar for license verification, which carries no tab data. There is no account or email required to use the extension.

Is full-text search free, and what does Pro cost?

Full-text search and unlimited snapshots are Pro features, available during the 14-day trial every install starts with. After the trial the Free tier keeps the latest 5 snapshots with manual save, restore, and JSON export. Pro is $3.99/month, $29/year, $59 one-time, or $19 one-time for the first 1,000 Founders buyers, with a 30-day refund.

Does Tabwell require Chrome 114 or later?

Yes. Chrome 114 is the minimum supported version because Tabwell uses the chrome.sidePanel API introduced there, alongside chrome.tabs and chrome.tabGroups. Edge and other Chromium browsers may work but are not officially supported. Firefox and Safari are not supported.