Firefox Tab Tips
March 21, 2008 – 8:21 pm by Gabe Anderson | 4 CommentsPeople who know me know that I’m all about using keyboard shortcuts whenever possible. Why? When my hands spend more time on the keyboard and less time on the mouse, I can maximize productivity and get more done in less time. So long as a shortcut exists and you know it well, the keyboard will always beat the mouse.
Along those lines, here are some of my favorite Firefox tab tips (some involving keyboard shortcuts, others not):
- Instead of opening your home page when Firefox starts, set it to restore your tabs & windows from last session (and you can still have a link associated with the home page icon): Tools -> Options -> Main -> When Firefox starts -> Show my windows and tabs from last time. That way, you can open a bunch of tabs for things that interest you or things you have to do, and can always pick up where you left off, should your computer or browser crash, or you simply need to restart Firefox for some reason.
- Set links that open a new window to open a new tab instead: Tools -> Options -> Tabs -> New pages should be opened in -> A new tab.
- Control-T, of course, will open a new tab for you to use as you please.
- Control-Tab to move forward/right to the next tab.
- Control-Shift-Tab to to move backward/left to the previous tab.
- Control-W closes a tab.
- Control-Shift-T will reopen that last tab you just closed — great for those accidental closes. And you can even do it repeatedly to reopen all the previous tabs you had open.
- Control-Click to open your clicked on link in a new tab (but remain on your active tab).
- Control-Shift-Click to open your clicked on link in a new tab (and immediately make it your active tab).
Enjoy these time-saving tips!
[ Subscribe to gabeanderson.com via email or RSS feed. ]
Hi, I'm Gabe Anderson. I've published more than 2,000 personal and professional blog entries on my other blogs since 2000.
4 Responses to “Firefox Tab Tips”
Your last two tips are reversed. Ctrl-Click will open in new tab and switch; Shift-Ctrl-Click will open in new tab without switching.
By Greg on Jun 13, 2008
Hi Greg- Not in my experience and on my systems… adding the shift always brings the focus to the new tab – Windows XP & Vista.
And I’m not the only one:
“If I do Control-click in Firefox, the link will open in a new tab in the background.”
What OS are you using?
By gabe on Jun 13, 2008
Hi Greg- I figured this one out. In Tools -> Options -> Tabs, I have the bottom option (“When I open a link in a new tab, switch to it immediately”) UNCHECKED.
If you CHECK that box, as I’m guessing you have, then you’ll observe the behavior you describe, and the opposite of what I originally described in this blog entry.
So we’re both right. 🙂
By gabe on Jun 19, 2008