What happened to Arc
In May 2025 The Browser Company told Arc users it had stopped building new features for Arc and moved its team to Dia, its AI-first browser. Arc still opens, still syncs and still gets Chromium security updates — nothing breaks tomorrow. But the browser you picked because it kept getting better has stopped getting better, and in September 2025 Atlassian agreed to buy the company that makes it for $610 million.
So the question most Arc users are asking is not whether to leave, it is what to keep. For most people that is the sidebar: tabs you can read, grouped by what they are for, instead of a row of favicons shrinking at the top of the window.
Keep the sidebar. Add a canvas.
Tabula has the sidebar you are used to. Pinned favourites sit in a grid at the top, every open site is listed below, and zones — Tabula’s Spaces — keep work, study and personal browsing apart. Pin it open, or let it tuck away until your cursor reaches the left edge of the screen — the way Arc’s does when you hide it.
The difference is what sits behind it. In Arc the sidebar points at one page; Split View raises that to four, and then you are managing panes. In Tabula every site is a live tile on an infinite canvas — really running, not a thumbnail — and you arrange tiles the way you would arrange paper on a desk: mail top-left, the doc you are writing in the middle, the dashboard you keep checking off to the right. Zoom out to see all of it; zoom into one tile to work in it.
The arrangement does a job the list cannot. You remember where things are rather than what they are called — the same spatial memory that finds a book on your own shelf without reading the spines. More on why that works.
Arc and Tabula, side by side
| Feature | Arc | Tabula |
|---|---|---|
| How tabs are shown | A vertical sidebar list | A sidebar list, plus live tiles on an infinite canvas |
| Sites on screen at once | One, or up to four in Split View | As many as you arrange |
| Pinned favourites | A pinned grid at the top of the sidebar | A pinned grid at the top of the sidebar |
| Separate contexts | Spaces and Profiles | Zones — two free, unlimited plus folders on the paid plan |
| Ad and tracker blocking | Through an extension | Built in |
| Chrome extensions | Yes | Yes, from the Chrome Web Store |
| Platforms | macOS, Windows, iPhone | macOS only |
| Rendering engine | Chromium | Chromium |
| Development | Maintenance only since May 2025 | Actively developed |
| Price | Free | Free; paid plan $9.99/month |
Where Arc still wins
If any of these is true, Tabula is the wrong switch today, and we would rather say so here than in a refund request.
- You live in extension toolbars. Tabula runs Chrome extensions, but it has no toolbar yet: a popup like a password manager’s opens from Settings, not from a button beside the address bar. How extensions work in Tabula.
- You work on Windows, or want the same browser on your phone. Tabula is Mac only.
- You want Arc’s exact shape and nothing else. Zen is closer. It is free, open source, built on Firefox, copies Arc’s layout on purpose and has a built-in Arc importer. How Zen and Tabula compare.
- You keep one tab open at a time. A canvas pays off when you are juggling five sites at once. For one-at-a-time browsing it is just more room.
Switching from Arc in ten minutes
- Download Tabula and open it. It is free, with two zones.
- Go down your pinned tabs in Arc’s sidebar and open each site in Tabula. Pin the ones you always keep open.
- Press Import next to Arc on the “Bring your sign-ins” screen, so the sites you are signed in to in Arc are signed in here too. The whole move, step by step.
- Arrange the canvas by how you work, not alphabetically: what you check constantly near the middle, reference material at the edges.
- Add the extensions you use in Arc from Settings › Extensions › From Your Other Browsers.
Questions
- Is Arc browser discontinued?
- Not shut down. In May 2025 The Browser Company stopped adding features to Arc and moved its team to Dia, its AI browser. Arc still works and still gets security updates, but it will not get new features.
- Can I import my Arc tabs into Tabula?
- Your sign-ins and extensions, yes: Tabula copies Arc’s cookies, so the sites you are signed in to in Arc are signed in here too, and it can add the extensions you use in Arc. Your tabs themselves are not imported yet — most people reopen the dozen or so sites they use every day, which takes a few minutes.
- Does Tabula support Chrome extensions?
- Yes. Tabula renders sites with Chromium, the same engine as Chrome and Arc, and installs extensions from the Chrome Web Store, from a built-in catalog or straight from Arc. There is no toolbar yet, so an extension’s popup opens from Settings. Ad and tracker blocking is built in either way.
- Is Tabula free?
- Yes. Tabula is free to download and free to keep using, with two zones. The paid plan, $9.99 a month, adds unlimited zones, folders and sync across machines.
- Is there a Windows version?
- Not yet. Tabula runs on macOS 12 or later, on Apple Silicon and Intel Macs.