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Michael_Buchner's avatar
Michael_Buchner
Brass Contributor
Oct 28, 2019

Switching between tabs using keyboard shortcut

In Firefox you can switch between two recently used tabs by pressing CTRL-TAB. Would be great to have this feature in Edge Chromium! Currently, CTRL-TAB switches between all open tabs.
Elliot Kirk's avatar
Elliot Kirk
Silver Contributor
Oct 30, 2019

Hi Michael_Buchner, we are investigating ways to make Tab switching hotkeys more usable.  Would you expect that CTRL+Shift only ever switch between the last two tabs?  If more how many?  What scenarios do you have that necessitate the rapid swapping of tabs?  This information will help us better understand the underlying jobs to be done, and help us craft better solutions.  Thanks - Elliot

alhpa's avatar
alhpa
Brass Contributor
Nov 22, 2019
Would you expect that CTRL+Shift only ever switch between the last two tabs?  If more how many?

Elliot Kirk: For reference, Firefox lets you switch between the six latest tabs, in MRU (most recently used) order.

In Opera, on the other hand, you can switch between all you open tabs in MRU order.

Ideally I would like to see no limit (like Opera) but I you are going to cap it, I would say four is the absolute minimum.

 

It's this lack of functionality in Chrome that has prevented me, and many with me, from using Chrome as my main browser ever since it was released. It is frequently described by non-Chrome users as being a blocker for switching. This feature https://bugs.chromium.org/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=5569 by hundreds of users, but Google simply refuses to implement it. As mentioned many times in the linked thread, it's a basic usability feature that even IE11 had (available as an option in the settings). It's akin to Alt+Tab for programs: you expect that feature across all OSs. Not including it would be a regression.

 

Elliot Kirk wrote:

What scenarios do you have that necessitate the rapid swapping of tabs?

I use it constantly: when I compare info in two (or more) tabs by quickly switching back and forth; when I quickly want return to my previous tab without closing the current tab I'm viewing, etc...

 

If you were to implement this I would make Edge my main browser, and you can be sure that you would gain many of the users that have refused to switch to Chrome so far because of this. You would have a significant feature over Chrome, and gain a lot a goodwill with many disgruntled non-Chrome users, and that can only be a good thing :smile:

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