Best Firefox Extensions to Manage Tabs (Plus Built-in Tab Groups)
Do you end every day with 50 tabs open in Firefox? You’re not alone. When this list of Firefox extensions to manage tabs was first published in 2009, you needed add-ons for almost everything. Today Firefox has built-in tab groups and vertical tabs, and the best tab manager extensions do much more. Here’s how to manage tabs in Firefox in 2026, with the built-in features first and then the best extensions.
Quick answer: Start with Firefox’s built-in tab groups (drag one tab onto another) and vertical tabs (Settings → General → Browser layout). For more power, the best Firefox extensions to manage tabs are Sidebery or Tree Style Tab for tree-style sidebars, OneTab to save memory, and Tab Session Manager to save and restore sets of tabs.
Table of Contents
Built-in Firefox tab management features
Tab groups
Since Firefox 137 (2025), you can group tabs natively. Drag a tab onto another tab, or right-click a tab and choose Add tab to new group. Give the group a name and colour, and click its label to collapse or expand it. Mozilla’s tab groups guide explains the details.
Vertical tabs
Firefox 136 added vertical tabs in a sidebar, which is much easier to read when you have dozens of tabs open. Go to Settings → General → Browser layout and choose Vertical tabs.
Other handy built-in tricks
- Search open tabs: type
%and a space in the address bar, then a word from the tab’s title. - Reopen closed tabs: press Ctrl+Shift+T (Cmd+Shift+T on Mac).
- Pin tabs: right-click and choose Pin Tab to keep Gmail or other always-open sites small and on the left.
- Mute tabs: click the speaker icon on a noisy tab.
- Firefox View: shows recently closed tabs, history and tabs open on your other devices.
- Select many tabs: Ctrl+click or Shift+click tabs to move, bookmark or close them together.
Best Firefox extensions to manage tabs in 2026
1. Sidebery
Sidebery turns the sidebar into a powerful tab manager with nested tree tabs, panels for different projects, container support and snapshots. If you open lots of tabs while researching, it’s the most complete option.
2. Tree Style Tab
Tree Style Tab shows tabs in a sidebar tree, so links you open appear under the page they came from. It’s a long-time favourite and works well with Firefox’s vertical tab layout.
3. OneTab
OneTab collapses all your open tabs into a single list with one click, freeing memory. Restore them individually or all at once when you need them again.
4. Tab Session Manager
Tab Session Manager saves your windows and tabs as named sessions and can auto-save them, so you never lose a set of tabs after a crash or restart.
5. Auto Tab Discard
Auto Tab Discard unloads tabs you haven’t used for a while to save memory and battery, while keeping them in the tab bar ready to reload.
6. Firefox Multi-Account Containers
Mozilla’s own Multi-Account Containers colour-codes tabs into containers such as Work, Personal and Shopping, each with separate cookies. You can be logged in to two accounts on the same site in different tabs.
7. Tab Stash
Tab Stash stashes groups of tabs into bookmarks so they sync across devices, a tidy alternative to OneTab for people who like to keep reading lists.
What happened to the 2009 tab extensions?
Our original list included Fox Tab (3D tab browsing), Colorful Tabs, Firefox Showcase, Tab Renamizer, New Tab Homepage, Duplicate Tab, Basics, Tab Popup, Close and Forget and Too Many Tabs. When Firefox moved to its modern WebExtensions system in 2017 (Firefox Quantum), most of these old add-ons stopped working. Many of their features are now built into Firefox: duplicate a tab by right-clicking it and choosing Duplicate Tab, set any page as your new tab page in settings, and use tab groups and colours instead of Colorful Tabs.
Frequently asked questions
Does Firefox have tab groups?
Yes. Firefox added native tab groups in 2025. Drag a tab onto another to create a group, then name it and pick a colour.
How do I turn on vertical tabs in Firefox?
Open Settings, go to General, and under Browser layout choose Vertical tabs. You can switch back to horizontal tabs the same way.
Which Firefox tab manager uses the least memory?
OneTab and Auto Tab Discard help most with memory, because they unload tabs you aren’t using.
This post was first written in 2009 by guest author Himanshu and has been fully updated for 2026.
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Thank you for this post, I haven’t even heard about some of these tools but knowing them will make my life easier now when I know how useful they are.
As Mark pointed out above, Search Tab is really awesome. You must really include this in your list.
I am sure you forgot “Search Tab”
Its AWESOME!!!
great list of FF extensions, i always stucked up with tabs in Firefox and definitely will try out some recommended add-on!
First thing I did when I got FF was download colorful tabs. I have to say I love that little add on
what about the New Tab King master: http://www.newtabking.com?
I use Tree Style Tab, Tab Mix Plus and ColorfulTabs.
That’s nice collection of Firefox add-ons, I recommend Bill Mason to use fasterfox add-on for Firefox to increasing speed,and also add /prefecth:1 to the target of Firefox shortcut to increase load speed.Let’s hope Firefox upcoming versions will be more stable and speedier.
The mind boggles as to how many addons and extensions that FF has embraced. I am at the point of trashing FF because it is getting so bloated and slow.They really need to address the browser speed issue before they just weld on anything that comes along. Is there any tutorials on how to speed up FF without getting to technical?
Thanks for read
Here is a quick way to speed up Firefox by tweaking the settings.