How to Enable and Customise Vertical Tabs in Microsoft Edge

Modern widescreen monitors offer substantial horizontal screen real estate, yet traditional web browsers continue to stack dozens of open tabs across a narrow horizontal strip at the top of the window. As you open more tabs, horizontal titles shrink until they are completely illegible, forcing you to guess which favicon corresponds to which webpage. Microsoft Edge solves this visual bottleneck with its built-in Vertical Tabs feature, moving your open webpages into an expandable vertical column along the left edge of the browser.

Enabling and personalising Vertical Tabs allows you to read full webpage titles, organise complex tab groups, and collapse the pane to maximise active browsing space.

Enabling Vertical Tabs in Microsoft Edge

Vertical Tabs are natively integrated into Microsoft Edge on Windows and macOS, requiring no third-party extensions.

1. Launch Microsoft Edge.
2. Locate the Tab actions menu icon (a small square with an arrow) in the top-left corner of the browser window, immediately beside your first open tab.
3. Click the icon and select Turn on vertical tabs.
4. Your horizontal tab bar instantly disappears, and all open webpages align vertically on the left side of your window.

Keyboard Shortcut: You can toggle Vertical Tabs on or off instantly at any time by pressing Ctrl + Shift + , (comma) on Windows or Cmd + Shift + , on macOS.

Collapsing and Expanding the Vertical Tab Pane

By default, the vertical tab bar displays full webpage titles alongside favicons. When you need extra horizontal space for spreadsheets, development tools, or side-by-side reading, you can collapse the pane into a slim icon strip:

1. At the top of the vertical tab column, click the Collapse pane (<) arrow icon.
2. The panel immediately shrinks to show only website favicons, reclaiming valuable desktop width.
3. To temporarily view tab titles without permanently expanding the bar, simply hover your mouse cursor over the collapsed strip. Edge expands an overlay pane displaying all titles, which retracts automatically once you move your cursor away.
4. To lock the tab bar in its fully expanded view again, click the Pin pane icon at the top of the expanded panel.

Organising Workspaces with Vertical Tab Groups

Vertical tabs make grouping related research topics, project documentation, and communication tools far more legible than horizontal strips:

1. Hold Ctrl (or Cmd on Mac) and click the tabs you wish to cluster together.
2. Right-click any selected tab and choose Add tabs to new group.
3. Assign a descriptive group name (for example, Market Research or Billing) and select a distinguishing colour tag.
4. Click the group header to collapse or expand all associated tabs simultaneously. In vertical layout, grouped tabs indent neatly beneath the header, providing clear hierarchical visibility.

Customising Title Bar Appearance in System Settings

When Vertical Tabs are enabled, you can reclaim even more vertical screen space by hiding the top window title bar:

1. Click the Settings and more (…) icon in the top-right corner of Edge and select Settings.
2. In the left sidebar, click Appearance.
3. Scroll down to the Customise browser section.
4. Toggle on the option labeled Hide title bar while in vertical tabs.
5. Edge immediately merges window controls directly into the top navigation bar, maximising screen area for website content.