Tab Preview - Discussion

Microsoft

Hi Insiders, thanks so much for your feedback on the tab experience in the new Microsoft Edge. From reading your comments, it is clear that many of you would like an easy way to view more information about your tabs to quickly identify which one you are looking for. This problem can be particularly painful when you have many tabs open at once, perhaps appearing similar to each other with repeated site titles or icons, and you'd like to avoid having to switch to each of them to find the right one. Many of you specifically cite "tab preview" from the legacy version of Microsoft Edge as a helpful tool in this situation.

Top Feedback Item: Bring the tab preview feature from the current version of Microsoft Edge

As we investigate this feedback further, we'd like to ask for your help to make sure we are solving the right problem and get the experience just right. For example, in the Microsoft Edge Legacy , there were actually a couple of methods to preview the contents of a tab. One way was to hover over a tab, and a little thumbnail and description of that specific tab would appear with more information. Another method was to select an arrow to the right of the new tab button to open a persistent preview of all the open tabs simultaneously.

Could you tell us more about your experience in this area, and what you would like to see going forward? For example, which of the legacy version of Microsoft Edge tab preview features did you specifically use, and how did you use it? What problems did this feature help you solve and how? What types of information is particularly useful in a preview of a tab and why?

Thanks for your help, we look forward to working with you to improve the new Microsoft Edge in this area.

132 Replies

@Elliot Kirk Please implement BOTH ways (hovering AND the arrow button) because they are both extremely useful and were amongst the best features of the old Edge.
Also please implement scrolling in the tab bar... When you have multiple tabs opened, they get very very tiny and basically useless. The way the old Edge handled this (by making the tabs scrollable) made it perfect.

2s is way too long. If i wanted to wait 2 seconds for every tab preview to appear, i could just click on each tab manually and see their contents myself.

to view the preview of 10 tabs, it would take 20 seconds. with my mouse I can cycle through 10 tabs in less than 7-8 seconds.

so I think the tab previews must be instant not to waste users time and be Actually useful.

@HotCakeX  I used opera but now I abandoned it.

@HotCakeX 

 

After you start the tab preview the others can pop up instantly after mousing over them (much like old edge), but tab previews intially should not be instant. I don't want to see a tab preview every time I move my mouse over the tab; if you go to move tabs or pull out to another window you shouldn't instantly be getting a preview of that tab if all you're doing is tab management.

 

2s might be high (and can be lowered) but I don't feel like it should be lower than 1 second (I believe old edge had a 1s delay). Tab previews haven't even been seen before by a large number of users I'm betting (people coming from Chrome, IE, Firefox) and having an instant preview could be a jarring experience for them and could be annoying if they instantly pop up every time.

 

If a tab preview button (like the old set aside button, but for all tabs) is implemented that showed all tab previews at once it would/should be instant.

@sgilder @HotCakeX 

 

I think how it works in legacy Edge is fine. There is a initial 1 second delay but after that if you move your mouse over other tabs, the preview instantly appears. Giving users the option to customize the preview delay or disable previews entirely also makes sense but I think having it enabled with a 1 second initial delay would be a good default.

@CLove3 

 

An option to disable the preview, if implemented, would make sense. I assume if hardware acceleration is turned off it would also need to disable the tab preview option as well, not sure though.

@SayanBhar 


@SayanBhar wrote:

@HotCakeX  I used opera but now I abandoned it.


And?

@sgilder 

Spoiler

@sgilder wrote:

@HotCakeX 

 

After you start the tab preview the others can pop up instantly after mousing over them (much like old edge), but tab previews intially should not be instant. I don't want to see a tab preview every time I move my mouse over the tab; if you go to move tabs or pull out to another window you shouldn't instantly be getting a preview of that tab if all you're doing is tab management.

 

2s might be high (and can be lowered) but I don't feel like it should be lower than 1 second (I believe old edge had a 1s delay). Tab previews haven't even been seen before by a large number of users I'm betting (people coming from Chrome, IE, Firefox) and having an instant preview could be a jarring experience for them and could be annoying if they instantly pop up every time.

 

If a tab preview button (like the old set aside button, but for all tabs) is implemented that showed all tab previews at once it would/should be instant.


Yes well I also think 1s is better than 2s

@CLove3 


@CLove3 wrote:

@sgilder @HotCakeX 

 

I think how it works in legacy Edge is fine. There is a initial 1 second delay but after that if you move your mouse over other tabs, the preview instantly appears. Giving users the option to customize the preview delay or disable previews entirely also makes sense but I think having it enabled with a 1 second initial delay would be a good default.


 

Yeah agree with you too! ^

@adrianghc The arrow dropdown also was a lifesaver when I was using my laptop as a tablet.

@Dan_AI4GK I recorded a video for you, since I still have the legacy edge. Another feature they should consider adding back is refresh all tabs. Its a really helpful way to apply changes in one tab to all of them, such as when you sign into one tab and want it to apply to the rest.

Yup, that's what we need, and I don't see why it can't be done. That was a big advantage that legacy Edge had over other browsers.

As a side note, how did you do the screen record?

Regards,

Dan

@Dan_AI4GK I used a school computer and screencast-o-matic was in the software center. There are a some extensions and apps out there that do the same thing, like screencastify.

@cjc2112 That Refresh All was a pretty handy feature. I almost forgot it was there.

@cjc2112 Thanks!

 

Dan

@Dan_AI4GK 

Spoiler

@Dan_AI4GK wrote:
As a side note, how did you do the screen record?

 

You can use Powerpoint => Insert => screen record

 

or use OBS: https://obsproject.com/

@cjc2112 

 

Spoiler

@cjc2112 wrote:

Another feature they should consider adding back is refresh all tabs. Its a really helpful way to apply changes in one tab to all of them, such as when you sign into one tab and want it to apply to the rest.


 

You can refresh either all tabs, 1 tab or any number between them, in the new Edge.

all you have to do is to hold CTRL and then click on any of your tabs you wish to refresh to select them. once you've selected your tabs, you press F5 for refresh or right-click and select refresh.

you can do the same thing to apply other group actions to tabs.

such as adding multiple tabs to a group, to a favorite folder etc etc.

@CLove3 @cjc2112 @Dan_AI4GK 

 

How to refresh all tabs or some tabs at the same time and do other bulk actions

https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/discussions/how-to-refresh-all-tabs-or-some-tabs-at-the-same-...

 

watch this video: (recorded in 1080p, 60FPS, MKV): https://streamable.com/qdb1s

@HotCakeX Thanks for that.

 

Dan

You're welcome!