Why vertical tabs
Screens are wider than they are tall, and web pages are rarely as wide as the screen. A sidebar spends a strip of that spare width on something useful: a list where every tab keeps its whole title, grouped however you like, that scrolls rather than shrinks as it grows. Drag the slider above past a dozen and the difference is not subtle.
At a glance
| Browser | Engine | How to turn it on | Also has |
|---|---|---|---|
| Zen | Firefox | On by default | Workspaces, Split View for four, Glance |
| Firefox | Firefox | Settings → General → Browser layout | Tab groups, Split View for two |
| Microsoft Edge | Chromium | The vertical tabs button, top left | Workspaces, sleeping tabs |
| Vivaldi | Chromium | Settings → Tabs → tab bar position | Tab Stacks, Tab Tiling, Workspaces |
| Tabula | Chromium | On by default | Pinned grid, zones, the canvas |
01
ZenVertical tabs as the whole design
In Zen the sidebar is not an option, it is the browser. Pinned sites sit in Essentials at the top, workspaces keep projects apart, and compact mode hides the whole thing until you reach for it. It is the closest design to Arc still being built. Zen and Tabula compared.
- Built around the sidebar from the start
- Workspaces, Essentials and a compact mode
- Free and open source
- Firefox add-ons, not Chrome extensions
- A smaller team than the big browsers
02
FirefoxVertical tabs without switching browsers
Firefox added native vertical tabs in 2025. Turn them on in Settings → General → Browser layout and your tabs move into the sidebar alongside bookmarks and history. If you already use Firefox, this is the zero-effort way to try vertical tabs.
- Built in — one setting, no add-on
- Tab groups, and Split View since Firefox 149
- An engine independent of Google’s
- The sidebar is plainer than Zen’s or Vivaldi’s
- No workspaces in the Arc sense
03
Microsoft EdgeVertical tabs with Chrome extensions
Edge is Chromium with a vertical tabs button in the top-left corner of the window. Click it and your tabs become a collapsible sidebar. Workspaces group tabs by project, and sleeping tabs quietly suspend the ones you have not touched in a while.
- A one-click vertical tabs button
- Sleeping tabs free memory from tabs you are not using
- Runs Chrome extensions
- Pushes Microsoft services and Copilot hard
- Busier interface than the others
04
VivaldiVertical tabs, customised to the pixel
Vivaldi lets you put the tab bar on the left or right, stack related tabs into one, tile several tabs side by side, and bundle it all into workspaces. It is the browser for people who want to decide how every part of it behaves.
- Tabs on any side of the window
- Tab Stacks, Tab Tiling and Workspaces
- Runs Chrome extensions; built-in mail and calendar
- So many settings it takes an afternoon to tune
- Busier out of the box than Zen
05
TabulaVertical tabs with a canvas behind them
Tabula has the sidebar — pinned favourites in a grid, every open site listed below, and zones in place of workspaces — but the list is not where you work. Every site is also a live tile on an infinite canvas, so you can see the ones you need side by side rather than one at a time. What a spatial browser is.
- An Arc-style sidebar with a pinned grid
- Every open site is also a live tile on the canvas
- Zones keep work and personal browsing apart
- No extension toolbar yet
- Mac only
- A canvas takes a minute to arrange the first time
Also with vertical tabs
- Arc — the browser that made vertical tabs popular; it still works but gets no new features. After Arc.
- Dia — brought vertical tabs back in late 2025; built around an AI assistant. Dia compared.
- Brave — a vertical tabs toggle, plus ad and tracker blocking by default.
- Chrome — added vertical tabs in April 2026, so you can now have them without switching browsers.
Questions
- Does Safari have vertical tabs?
- No. Safari’s sidebar lists tab groups, not the tabs inside them — the tabs themselves stay in a strip across the top. For vertical tabs on a Mac you need one of the browsers above.
- Which browser has the best vertical tabs?
- Zen, if you want Arc’s design. Vivaldi, if you want to customise everything. Firefox, if you want vertical tabs without changing browsers. Tabula, if you want a sidebar plus every site visible on a canvas.
- Are vertical tabs better than horizontal tabs?
- Once you have more than a handful open, usually yes: each tab keeps a full-width row, so titles stay readable and the list scrolls instead of shrinking. The cost is horizontal space, which is why most of these browsers let you collapse or hide the sidebar.
- Do vertical tabs work with extensions?
- In Edge, Vivaldi and Tabula you keep Chrome extensions; in Zen and Firefox you use Firefox add-ons.