Some of the first pictures of the new Google Chrome feature Tab Groups

Google has yet again proven it’s R&D department is always on steroids; churning out new features time and time again. The latest new feature is on Google Chrome called the Tab Groups.

Though the feature is still in beta, and will probably take months to arrive if at all! The news of Tab Group feature on Chrome was first made public about four months ago by Google engineers. They announced they were working on the new feature.

This feature has been described by many tech enthusiasts as one sadly lacking on the popular browser Chrome. Its arrival will be highly appreciated by users.

What does Tab Groups on Chrome do?

As you might have deduced from the name, Tab Groups will enable the user to organize opened tabs into multiple groups. Giving you greater control of the Chrome browser by clearing the clutter that comes with too many simultaneously opened tabs.

With Tab Groups, you can now work with about tens of tabs at one go, and still not be distracted by the clutter that is too many opened tabs side-by-side. The following are the screenshots of the work-in-progress of the new feature.

It is important to note that these are some of the very first pictures of the feature. The Tab Groups feature is not even available in the current versions of Chrome Canary. The pictures are from screenshot shared by a Chromium engineer.

Much of the coding and development of the Tab Groups over the last four months have been taking place in the codebase. That is where the UI will work.

However, suppose for some reason you want to be among the ‘very’ earliest birds. You will have to install the Chrome Canary and go to chrome://flags page and then enable the Tab Groups option.

The Vivaldi browser already supports Tab Groups

Only users with advanced technical skills are advised to try on the Tab Groups in beta stage. Even then, they should do so on devices they don’t use for sensitive work. As for the rest of Chrome browser users, you will have to wait a little while longer.

Alternatively, you can switch to Vivaldi browser, which already has the Tab Groups functionality and runs on Chromium platform. This browser is using the same concept of Tab Groups that Opera browser dropped somewhere along the way.

At one point, Firefox did have Tab Groups, but Mozilla removed it from the browser’ code after reports showed very few users were actively using it. You know it costs money to support a codebase, and one that churns out codes for products and features no one uses is quickly killed off. So that begs the question:

If Tab Groups once available on Firefox, Opera, and now Vivaldi is not a big-hit-feature, what makes Google introduce it to Chrome?