It is really simple to retrieve the last tab or window you had open, here's how...
Our screens can quickly become cluttered. You are browsing away and end up with an inordinate number of tabs or windows open. It can get quite confusing to navigate. You decide it is time to do a cull and get rid of the ones you don’t need. However, in Google Chrome, an involuntary jolt of the mouse or a rogue keystroke, can easily result in the wrong tab or window being shut down!
For some users, this scenario can be a highly panic-inducing affair! A student may have loads of tabs open containing references and sources for their essay, that they are still yet to cite properly, but have not bookmarked. Or within business, an employee may be conducting market research for a new digital asset, but accidentally closes down the tab detailing the product they are interested in.
Well we are here to tell you the good news. If this situation occurs, all is not lost. You do not need to hit panic stations! Google Chrome has actually considered this very scenario and built in a safety net to rectify it should it happen. They have made it really simple to retrieve the last tab or window you had open.
How to restore recently closed tabs and windows using keyboard shortcuts
Keyboard shortcut to reopen your last closed tab or window on Mac
To reopen the last closed tab on your Mac:
- Press Cmd + alt + T or Cmd + option + T
Keyboard shortcut to reopen your last closed tab or window on Windows
To reopen the last closed tab on your PC:
- Tap Ctrl + alt + T
These shortcuts will re-open the last tab you closed down. However, if the last thing you closed down was a whole window, it will re-open that window and all of the tabs contained within.
If you were to repeat these shortcuts multiple times, Google Chrome will make its way through the list of closed tabs or windows (from most recently closed down working backwards) and reopen them.
How to selectively restore recently closed tabs and windows
With this method, you can select individual tabs (website page titles) within a closed window and windows that you would like to recover. You can pick and choose what is and isn’t useful to you.
For those of you who prefer to navigate the world wide web using a mouse, you can also retrieve tabs and windows you closed down (accidental or not) using this method. To do so, use the following steps:
- Click the kebab menu (three vertically stacked dots) in the top right-hand corner of your open Google Chrome browser window.
- Go to History > Recent tabs (you will see all of your recently closed tabs and windows listed below).
- To restore:
- A single closed tab: click on the tab (website page title) you would like to restore.
- A single closed window: A closed window will present itself in this list as a number of tabs for e.g. 5 Tabs. Click this and then hit “restore window.”
At Appdrawn Software Development, our mission is to make software work for the user, not the other way round! If you found this tip useful, there is a lot more where that came from. Our Tech Tip blog series has a myriad of tips, tricks and shortcuts to help you navigate this digital age with ease!