Have you ever wanted to compare the contents of two browser tabs side by side?
A quite common situation occurred to me a few days ago when a client asked me to compare two computers that she had shortlisted for possible purchase.
She sent me the links to the web pages that she had been looking at and I duly loaded them into my browser (I still use Firefox as the privacy add-ons are better than on other browsers). This meant that I had two different tabs open and, as you might expect, I found myself clicking between them, comparing feature with feature on the two products. This soon started to fry my brain and I decided that it would be better if I could see them both at the same time, side-by-side. I couldn’t immediately think how to do that and thought instead about opening another instance of Firefox (which you can do by right-clicking the taskbar icon – on Windows 7 and 8, anyway – and taking the appropriate option).
Then it dawned on me that this was one of those occasions where our habits tend to lead us to do something that is sub-optimal because we can’t be bothered to spend a bit of time learning a better way. I’m pretty sure that we all do that quite often. Sometimes I’m looking over a client’s shoulder and catch them doing something a long way round. I’m very happy to show them a quicker way if I know one. In these situations, I am always reminded of the way I used to drive around London (before giving up driving altogether over 20 years ago). I would drive from known point to known point until I got near where I was going and only then would I think about how to home in on the destination. It meant, of course, that I was zig-zagging around town like a demented yachtsman, instead of learning the proper way (“No wonder you gave up driving”, I hear you say).
Anyway, I decided on this occasion that it’s time I sorted this one out and shared it with you.
It’s possible that this doesn’t work on older versions of browsers. I’m not going to molly-coddle users of such browsers by investigating and providing alternatives because I’m not going to encourage the use of old versions of browsers. It’s a good idea to keep your browser updated. Holes in browsers are a major entry point for the baddies out there to get at your computer, so it’s a good idea to keep up with the latest browser.
I tried this on the following versions of browsers:
- Firefox – 23.0.1
- Chrome – 29.0.1547.57
- Internet Explorer – 10
- Safari – 5.1.7 on PC and 6.0.5 on Mac
I couldn’t find a way of moving a tab to a new window in Opera. Instead, you can arrange tabbed windows side-by-side by right-clicking on a tab and then choosing “Arrange” and “Tile vertically” or “Tile horizontally”
If you are still using Windows XP, then the latest version of Internet Explorer you can install is version 8. This version does not allow you to drag tabs away from their bar. In that case, you may think you’ve just wasted five minutes of your life, but I’m going to take the opportunity to remind you that Microsoft will cease support for Windows XP (and Office 2003) in April 2014 and it may become very unsafe to use your computer online thereafter. Start thinking about replacing it. See this previous blog about Microsoft ceasing support for Windows XP and Office 2003.
Having split your tabs into two separate browser windows, you can then easily show two windows side by side by allocating half the screen to each window – if, that is, you are using a PC with Windows 7 or 8. I detailed the process for this here.
So, there you go, a shortcut that’s easy, almost universal, and intuitive (once you’ve used it once or twice).
(Last updated 06/12/2023)