The Frozen Tabs
Google Chrome is notoriously hungry for system RAM. To combat this, Google introduced a feature called “Memory Saver.” When enabled, Chrome silently monitors your open tabs. If you haven’t clicked on a specific tab in a while, the browser will literally delete the webpage from your computer’s active memory to free up resources. While this is great for laptops with only 8GB of RAM, it is an absolute nightmare for power users. When you finally click back to that older tab, the entire page has to aggressively reload from scratch. If you were in the middle of filling out a massive web form or reading a dynamically loaded article, all your progress is instantly wiped out. If you have plenty of RAM, you must disable this aggressive feature.
How to Turn Off Memory Saver
You can revoke Chrome’s permission to purge your background tabs via the Performance settings.
- Open the Google Chrome desktop browser.
- Click the three vertical dots (⋮) in the top right corner and select Settings.
- In the left-hand sidebar, click on Performance.
- Look at the very first section, labeled “Memory Saver.”
- You will see a master toggle switch. Toggle this switch to the Off position (the switch will turn grey).
True Multitasking
The change is instantaneous. Chrome will completely stop monitoring your tab inactivity. If you open 40 tabs and walk away from your computer for three days, every single one of those tabs will remain perfectly preserved in your system’s active RAM, exactly as you left them, completely eliminating the frustrating forced reloads.