I tested Chrome's soon-to-be-released vertical tab feature, and it makes the browser so much better

3 weeks ago 15

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ZDNET's key takeaways

Google is finally adding vertical tabs to Chrome.
Vertical tabs make tab management so much easier.
The feature is currently only available on Canary.

I've been a fan of vertical tabs for a long time. Vertical tabs make it easier to manage a growing number of tabs, keeping them better organized and visible. Most of my favorite browsers (except for Opera -- are you listening?) have vertical tabs.

Once you start using them, you'll wonder how you got along without them.

At the moment, the vertical tabs feature is only available to the Canary release of Chrome, which isn't suitable for everyday work. But if you want to get a peek into what's coming to Chrome, Canary is the way to go. The one issue with Canary is that it's not considered stable, so having it as your default browser could lead to lost data and plenty of frustration. If you don't want to bother with Canary, you can expect vertical tabs to hit general availability in the next couple of months.

Also: Web browsers need to stop trying to be all things to everyone

I'm thrilled that Chrome is finally getting vertical tabs, so more users can make use of this game-changing feature. Why are vertical tabs such an important feature? The best reason is that they make it so much easier to see what tab is what. If you're like me, and you keep a metric ton of tabs open per window, it can be challenging to discern which tab is which. Vertical tabs do away with this confusion to make it easy to find the tab I'm looking for. Vertical tabs also make for a cleaner browser, which can lead to more efficient use. You also get more screen real estate with vertical tabs.

This feature will be such a welcome change for Chrome. I do, however, wish Google would also add to the mix a Workspaces-like feature (such as the one found on Opera), to bring tab management on the same level as Opera, Safari, Zen, and other browsers with Workspaces-type features.

Even without a Workspaces-esque option, Chrome getting vertical tabs is a big deal.

If you're daring enough to download and install Canary (it won't interfere with your current Chrome installation), let me show you how to enable vertical tabs.

Enable vertical tabs on Chrome Canary

What you'll need: The only thing you'll need for this is the latest version of Chrome Canary installed on your desktop platform of choice (I tested the feature on Pop!_OS Linux).

If you don't already have Canary installed, you can download the binary installer file from the official nightly site.

After the installation, open Chrome Canary from your desktop menu.

In the Chrome address bar, type chrome://flags. In the resulting window, click the drop-down and select Enable.

For the changes to take effect, you have to restart Chrome, which can be done by clicking the Relaunch button.

Add vertical tabs to Chrome

Now that the feature is enabled, you have to move the tab bar from the top to the side. Here's how.

1. Open Settings

Click the three-dot menu button near the top-right corner of the Chrome window and click Settings.

2. Navigate to the feature

Go to Appearance, and search for Tab Strip Position. Click the associated drop-down and select Side.

Also: I've used nearly every browser out there, and these are my top 4 (spoiler: Chrome is out)

Your tab strip should automatically move from the top to the left side. You can now drag-and-drop tabs in whatever order you want, create tab groups, customize tab groups (color and name), and even minimize the vertical tabs to a cleaner sidebar.

I would highly recommend that you either give vertical tabs a try on Canary. If you're not OK with unstable software, at least make sure you use the feature when it's made available to the general public.

You won't regret the shift.

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