Modern web browsers consume a significant amount of system memory (RAM). To combat this and improve battery life on laptops, Microsoft Edge includes a feature called “Sleeping Tabs.” When you have multiple tabs open, Edge will automatically suspend or “put to sleep” the tabs you have not looked at recently. While this saves resources, it can be incredibly frustrating if you are monitoring a live dashboard, waiting for a webmail notification, or listening to audio in a background tab.
The Problem with Sleeping Tabs
When Edge puts a tab to sleep, the webpage effectively stops running. When you click back to that tab, the browser must wake it up, which often causes the page to completely reload. This reloading process can cause you to lose unsaved work in web forms, disconnect from web-based chat applications, or miss critical real-time updates.
How to Disable Sleeping Tabs Completely
If your computer has plenty of RAM and you prefer that your tabs remain active at all times, you can turn off the Sleeping Tabs feature entirely.
- Open Microsoft Edge.
- Click the three horizontal dots (Settings and more) in the top-right corner of the browser window.
- Select Settings from the drop-down menu.
- In the left-hand sidebar, click on System and performance.
- Scroll down to the “Optimize Performance” section.
- Find the toggle switch labelled Save resources with sleeping tabs and turn it Off.
Your tabs will no longer go to sleep automatically, ensuring background processes continue running without interruption.
How to Whitelist Specific Websites
If you want to keep the memory-saving benefits of Sleeping Tabs but need certain websites to stay awake (such as your email client or a live stock ticker), you can add exceptions.
- Navigate to the System and performance menu in Edge Settings.
- Ensure Save resources with sleeping tabs is turned On.
- Look for the section titled Never put these sites to sleep.
- Click the Add button.
- Type the URL of the website you want to keep awake (e.g.,
mail.google.com) and click Add.
Edge will now automatically put background tabs to sleep, but it will never suspend the specific websites you added to this whitelist.