The Lost Browsing Session
By default, Google Chrome treats every browsing session as temporary. If you have a dozen tabs open for a research project and you accidentally click the red “X” to close the browser, or if you simply shut down your computer for the night, all of those tabs are instantly closed. When you launch Chrome the next morning, you are greeted with a completely blank New Tab page. Unless you manually dig through your History menu to find the “Recently Closed” list and restore the session, your workflow is completely disrupted.
How to Force Chrome to Remember Open Tabs
You can change Chrome’s startup behavior so that it acts like a persistent workspace, automatically reopening every single tab exactly where you left off when you previously closed the browser.
1. Open Google Chrome.
2. Click the three vertical dots in the top-right corner of the window.
3. Select Settings from the drop-down menu.
4. In the left-hand sidebar, click on On startup.
5. You will see three radio button options in the main pane.
6. The default is likely set to “Open the New Tab page.”
7. Select the middle option: Continue where you left off.
How to Protect Specific Tabs Forever
While the “Continue where you left off” setting is fantastic for daily use, it is still vulnerable. If you close a specific tab before closing the browser, Chrome assumes you are done with it and it will not reopen. To make a tab completely permanent (such as your email inbox or a calendar), right-click the tab at the very top of the screen and select Pin. The tab will shrink to a small icon and lock to the left side of the screen. Pinned tabs cannot be accidentally closed with an “X” and are guaranteed to launch every single time you open Chrome.