An open laptop on a wooden desk by a window, seen from the side with its screen turned away, beside a mug and a closed notebook
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doodletab

WHAT THE RESEARCH FOUND

Every tab is
a promise.

ONE TASK one set of tabs

  • Know why it is open
  • Make a plan, then close
  • Switch less often
  • Fewer tabs, clearer head

Most open tabs are things we mean to come back to.

Researchers who logged and interviewed browser users found tabs doing jobs they were never designed for: reminders, to-do lists, short-term bookmarks. When the promises pile up, so does the strain on attention, and sometimes on the computer.

Updated

Why is it open?

THE SHORT ANSWER

Tabs are doing
the job of a list.

Most tabs are opened with good intentions.
The trouble starts when they become the plan.

REMINDERS

Tabs as a to-do list

In a 2010 University of Toronto study, 17 of 21 participants said they often kept a tab open as a reminder to do something.

Why is yours open?

OVERLOAD

The black-hole fear

Carnegie Mellon researchers found people kept tabs open because they feared that out of sight meant gone, even as the number became unmanageable.

See the numbers

ATTENTION

Write the plan, close the tab

Unfinished goals cause intrusive thoughts, but in experiments making a specific plan for them removed those effects.

Try it today

A QUICK TAB CHECK

Why is this
tab open?

Pick the reason that fits the tab you are looking at. The bar is a rough guide to how strongly the studies tie that reason to tabs piling up.

Tab check

Choose a reason
A quick side taskUsually closes

Many tabs are opened for one purpose and closed when it is done. In the Toronto study, 45% of tabs were switched to exactly once.

Saving it to read laterShort-term bookmark

4 of 21 participants used tabs as short-term bookmarks. Several said they rarely used real bookmarks.

Comparing options for a decisionOverload risk

Carnegie Mellon found overload often comes from decisions that pull information from many sources, such as comparing reviews and guides before a purchase.

A reminder to do somethingMake a plan

The most common reason in the Toronto study: 17 of 21 participants used tabs as reminders. A written plan can do the same job.

I'm afraid I'll lose itBlack-hole fear

Carnegie Mellon researchers found the fear that a closed page was gone for good kept tabs open even when people felt overwhelmed.

Sources: Dubroy and Balakrishnan, A Study of Tabbed Browsing (CHI 2010, University of Toronto); Carnegie Mellon University news, Overcoming Tab Overload (May 2021).

Based on a 2010 University of Toronto study of 21 browser users and a 2021 Carnegie Mellon study of tab use. General information about habits, not a rule.

TWO NUMBERS WORTH KNOWING

Opened is not
the same as read.

One figure on how many tabs we never look at,
one on what switching between tasks can cost.

25%

Tabs opened but never looked at

Logging 21 people's browsing for 13 to 21 days each, researchers found 25% of tabs were opened and closed without ever being switched to, and more than two thirds were used once or less.

TAB USE · UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO

up to 40%

Productive time lost to task switching

The APA says switch costs can be a few tenths of a second each but add up, and cites psychologist David Meyer saying brief mental blocks from shifting tasks can cost as much as 40% of productive time.

SWITCHING · AMERICAN PSYCHOLOGICAL ASSOCIATION

In the 2021 Carnegie Mellon study, about 25% of participants in one part of the study said their browser or computer had crashed because they had too many tabs open.

FOUR HABITS TO TRY

Close the tab,
keep the thought.

A hand gently closing a laptop lid on a tidy desk in warm evening light
AI-generated image, not a photograph of a real person or place.

None of these needs a new app. They turn tabs back into what they are good at: holding the pages for the job in front of you.

  1. Ask why it is open

    Reminder, comparison, or reading for later? Naming the job tells you where it belongs instead.

  2. Move reminders to a list

    Write the task and when you will do it. Specific plans removed the pull of unfinished goals in experiments.

  3. Group tabs by task

    Keep one window or group per job, so switching jobs is one move rather than a hunt along a shrinking tab bar.

  4. Finish a decision, then clear it

    When the comparison is done, note the answer and close the sources you no longer need.

WHY IT FEELS HARD TO CLOSE

Unfinished things
stay on our minds.

A hand writing with a pencil on a blank page of a notebook next to a laptop keyboard
AI-generated image, not a photograph of a real person or place.

Psychologists have long found that unfinished goals keep pulling at attention, sometimes called the Zeigarnik effect. In a 2011 set of studies, unfinished goals caused intrusive thoughts and worse performance on unrelated tasks.

Letting people write a specific plan for the goal removed those effects. An open tab is a visible unfinished goal; a written plan may let you close it with the thought safely parked.

Questions

Questions people ask

Is it bad to have lots of tabs open?

Not always. Carnegie Mellon researchers found tabs help some people and overwhelm others. Problems tend to come when tabs pile up as reminders and unfinished decisions, straining attention and sometimes the computer.

Why do I keep tabs I never read?

You are not alone. A University of Toronto study found 25% of tabs were opened and closed without ever being switched to. Carnegie Mellon researchers found people felt invested in their tabs and feared losing them.

How old are browser tabs?

Carnegie Mellon researchers say tabs first showed up in web browsers in 2001 and have not changed much since, while the web itself has grown enormously.

Does switching between tabs slow me down?

Switching between tasks has a cost. The APA summarises research showing people lose time each time they switch, more so for complex or unfamiliar tasks, and these small costs add up.

What can replace a reminder tab?

A short written plan. In studies by Masicampo and Baumeister, making a specific plan for an unfinished goal removed the intrusive thoughts it otherwise caused.

Sources

Where the facts come from

  1. Carnegie Mellon University: Overcoming Tab Overload (2021)
  2. Dubroy and Balakrishnan: A Study of Tabbed Browsing (CHI 2010, University of Toronto)
  3. American Psychological Association: Multitasking, switching costs
  4. Masicampo and Baumeister (2011): Consider it done! Plan making and unfulfilled goals (PubMed)

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