We need to rethink the whole tab concept entirely. They've become too unwieldily, and while that's partly my fault, I also think it's a UI problem.
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Opera One Browser Adds Vertical Tabs - Should Safari Follow?
- Thread starter MacRumors
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
I am still of fan of window mode. The idea that someone has just a single browser window open with a 1000 tabs is crazy, and people are trying to manage that with Tab Groups, with the latest being AI in Safari creating "smart" groups.
Just use multiple windows, with each being a group. It's a forgotten technique in the world of browsers.
I have one Window each for my MacRumors session, one for my tech work, one for my documentation sites, one for pr0n... you know, the priorities.
Just use multiple windows, with each being a group. It's a forgotten technique in the world of browsers.
I have one Window each for my MacRumors session, one for my tech work, one for my documentation sites, one for pr0n... you know, the priorities.
BillyJoeJimBob
macrumors regular
Wish the younger folks here could have experienced the internet before everything turned into ads, slop, clickbait, and social-engineering insanity. –Basically all of it pre-social media. It was really useful. Now it's all ads. I even remember from many many years ago when a Google search yielded really useful results. Now it's all rank-ordered ads and slop. Maybe it all died when Netscape was deactivated. 😛
thebarrkbyte
macrumors member
Vertical space is infinite due to scrolling. Any content long enough will still scroll even in a browser with vertical tabs. Horizontal space is more precious, by far.
It's funny how you now have to be over a certain age to remember Netscape. I was reading an article recently about browser wars, and the IE/Netscape war wasn't even mentioned.
Haiku_Oezu
macrumors 6502a
Definitely
I switched to vertical tabs with Arc and I miss them every time I have to use Safari
Honestly all they have to do is give you the option to hide tabs when the sidebar is open - they’re 80% of the way there
I switched to vertical tabs with Arc and I miss them every time I have to use Safari
Honestly all they have to do is give you the option to hide tabs when the sidebar is open - they’re 80% of the way there
bollman
macrumors 6502a
This!
What is wrong with windows? And NOT full screen windows, mind you.
I hate full screen windows/applications on my computer, ffs, it is not an iPhone, I want smaller windows that slightly overlap to give me the overview of what I have going on.
A browser session consists of multiple windows with a sane amount of tabs in each, loosley grouped. When done, close all tabs and windows. Next session: start clean!
Oh, and Netscape? I still remember NCSA Mosaic 😉
JackNL
macrumors regular
From the one screenshot in the article that doesn't look great but as someone who moved from Windows 11 to macOS Tahoe about 3 months ago one of the big things I miss is Microsoft Edge vertical tabs so if Apple did an implementation similar to that I would be very happy.
Edge has the option to have vertical tabs down the left edge of the screen (maybe configurable - I left mine on the left) but they weren't the space hogs seen in this Opera screenshot, they were on a very narrow sidebar only wide enough for the favicon for each tab. Just the favicons were usually enough for me to easily identify the tab I wanted and switch to it (where a favicon was placed vertically gave additional clues) but if I had lots of tabs open on the same site - maybe comparing products in Amazon - hovering over the sidebar temporarily expanded it to show the leftmost bit of each tab's URL (or all of it if it was a short URL) and from there I always found it possible to quickly identify the tab I wanted to switch to. After selection the sidebar collapsed again to take up minimal horizontal space.
I loved Edge's vertical tabs so yes please Apple, bring that to Safari. I would have though that a simple auto-expanding sidebar would have taken far less software development resource than the fancy AI-based auto-grouping of tabs being introduced in OS 27 so it adds to my frustration that Apple for some reason skipped over a simpler (I assume) feature that (I suspect) would have made many people happy but instead skipped right over that possibility and did the AI stuff instead.
Edge has the option to have vertical tabs down the left edge of the screen (maybe configurable - I left mine on the left) but they weren't the space hogs seen in this Opera screenshot, they were on a very narrow sidebar only wide enough for the favicon for each tab. Just the favicons were usually enough for me to easily identify the tab I wanted and switch to it (where a favicon was placed vertically gave additional clues) but if I had lots of tabs open on the same site - maybe comparing products in Amazon - hovering over the sidebar temporarily expanded it to show the leftmost bit of each tab's URL (or all of it if it was a short URL) and from there I always found it possible to quickly identify the tab I wanted to switch to. After selection the sidebar collapsed again to take up minimal horizontal space.
I loved Edge's vertical tabs so yes please Apple, bring that to Safari. I would have though that a simple auto-expanding sidebar would have taken far less software development resource than the fancy AI-based auto-grouping of tabs being introduced in OS 27 so it adds to my frustration that Apple for some reason skipped over a simpler (I assume) feature that (I suspect) would have made many people happy but instead skipped right over that possibility and did the AI stuff instead.
k1121j
macrumors 68020
DaveP
macrumors 6502a
Why would people argue that something shouldn't be added as a totally optional feature? Ah, yes, it's the Internet.
Actual usability depends greatly on your screen size. If you are using a 13" laptop, tabs on the top could make more sense. I'm using a 27 inch, 5120x2880 display and have tons of wasted horizontal space that makes much more sense for tabs and allows better usability by allowing longer tab titles to be displayed.
Actual usability depends greatly on your screen size. If you are using a 13" laptop, tabs on the top could make more sense. I'm using a 27 inch, 5120x2880 display and have tons of wasted horizontal space that makes much more sense for tabs and allows better usability by allowing longer tab titles to be displayed.
rafark
macrumors 68020
I actually develop software for the web. The dock, the menu bar and the browser frame already take a lot of vertical real estate. The actual usable space after all that noise is drastically reduced especially on laptops which seem to be the majority of desktop users. There’s much more space available horizontally. A lot of horizontal space is wasted. The browser that does this the best is arc, my favorite browser. Look at how much better it looks:
I wouldn't mind if it was an option. But I would rather not, because it seems hard to get the Safari team to maintain robust features like this for Mac...
I switched to vertical tabs in all my browsers about a week ago. It definitely takes getting used to, but I'm getting there, and I like it, and more each day. I really hope Safari gets true vertical tabs (ie. able to switch away from horizontal tabs).
I just hope Apple doesn't make the same UI (IMO) mistake other browsers have. My main complaint with their implementation is now web pages feel disconnected from their tabs. And that's because they're visually disconnected. For most browsers I've used, the traditional horizontal tab is directly attached to each web page, almost like a little extra piece (tab) of the page, analogous to the tab of a paper manila folder. But in every browser I use--Chrome, Firefox, Edge--the vertical tab I'm currently viewing looks like a button in a sidebar, rather than a tab of a webpage. Even if it's not in the traditional position or shape, it's the fact that it's separated that makes it not feel like a tab. It needs to be connected and an extension of the page. It's a tiny graphical UI thing, but I think it makes a big difference in terms of immediately and intuitively knowing your context, simply from a visual cue even in your peripheral vision.
I also think when you have enough tabs open that you have to scroll to see all your tabs, if the tab of the page you're currently viewing is out of view, then there should be a visual indication at the top or bottom of the vertical tabs telling you which direction to scroll to get to your currently opened tab. Again, none of the browsers I use do this.
I just hope Apple doesn't make the same UI (IMO) mistake other browsers have. My main complaint with their implementation is now web pages feel disconnected from their tabs. And that's because they're visually disconnected. For most browsers I've used, the traditional horizontal tab is directly attached to each web page, almost like a little extra piece (tab) of the page, analogous to the tab of a paper manila folder. But in every browser I use--Chrome, Firefox, Edge--the vertical tab I'm currently viewing looks like a button in a sidebar, rather than a tab of a webpage. Even if it's not in the traditional position or shape, it's the fact that it's separated that makes it not feel like a tab. It needs to be connected and an extension of the page. It's a tiny graphical UI thing, but I think it makes a big difference in terms of immediately and intuitively knowing your context, simply from a visual cue even in your peripheral vision.
I also think when you have enough tabs open that you have to scroll to see all your tabs, if the tab of the page you're currently viewing is out of view, then there should be a visual indication at the top or bottom of the vertical tabs telling you which direction to scroll to get to your currently opened tab. Again, none of the browsers I use do this.