Move Quickly Between Browser Tabs

It is hard to believe that there was ever a time that we survived without browser tabs.  It is a rare event when I only have one tab open.  Currently, I have two browser windows open.  One browser window has three open tabs and the other has seven open tabs.  Before tabbed browsing, that would have been ten separate windows I would have had open.  Even for those who do not open quite as many tabs as me, tabs are still a great way to organize two or three web pages.

However, when you have multiple tabs open at a time, switching between them can take time if you reach for the mouse for each switch.  Fortunately, all the major browsers have some key combinations to help you move between tabs more quickly.  Even better, the same key combinations are used on Internet Explorer, Google Chrome, and Mozilla Firefox.

Here are a few of the best key combinations to use with tabs:

Open a New Tab:  Ctrl + T will open a new tab.

Open the Last Closed Tab:  If you accidentally close a tab you wanted open, use Ctrl + Shift + T to reopen it.

Switch Between Tabs:  Ctrl + Page Down moves to the next tab.  Ctrl + Page Up moves to the previous tab.  (I thought this key combination worked on Internet Explorer, but it did not work on my computer.)

Go To a Specific Tab:  Use Ctrl + [Number] to advance to a specific tab.  For example, Ctrl + 1 moves to the first tab, Ctrl + 2 moves to the second tab, etc.  If you have more than eight tabs, this tip will only allow you to move directly to the first eight.

Move to the Last Tab:  Regardless of the number of tabs open, Ctrl + 9 moves to the last tab.