How to Prevent Specific Websites from Sleeping in Microsoft Edge

To preserve battery life and minimize RAM overhead on modern laptops, Microsoft Edge includes an aggressive resource-management feature known as “Sleeping Tabs”. After an inactive period—typically ranging from 30 seconds to two hours—Edge suspends background tabs, unloads their DOM trees from active system memory, and displays them with a faded icon.

While this optimization works brilliantly for static reading articles, it can be disastrous for real-time web applications. Financial trading terminals, continuous audio streams, server-status monitoring dashboards, and unfinished web forms frequently stop synchronizing or lose unsaved state when suspended. Fortunately, Microsoft Edge allows you to define an exclusion list of domains that are permanently exempted from sleep mode.

Step 1: Open Edge System and Performance Settings

Exclusion rules are managed inside Edge’s core performance configuration panel:

1. Launch Microsoft Edge.
2. Click the three dots (…) icon in the top-right corner of the window.
3. Select Settings from the drop-down menu.
4. In the left sidebar, click System and performance (or navigate directly by typing edge://settings/system into the address bar and pressing Enter).

Step 2: Access the Never Put These Sites to Sleep Section

Scroll down through the right-hand panel to the Optimise Performance section:

1. Ensure that Save resources with sleeping tabs is toggled on (if you wish to keep the benefit for other casual tabs).
2. Locate the subsection titled Never put these sites to sleep.
3. Click the Add button located on the far right.

Step 3: Add Website URLs and Wildcard Domains

A modal dialogue box titled Add a site will pop up on your display:

1. Type or paste the specific website address you wish to exclude (for example: tradingview.com or https://app.slack.com).
2. Tip: To exempt all subdomains under an entire organization simultaneously, use an asterisk wildcard prefix, such as:

[*.]github.com

3. Click Add.

Step 4: Alternative Method: Exclude Active Tabs Directly

If you are currently working in a tab that you do not want Edge to put to sleep:

1. Right-click the active tab header in the tab strip at the top of the browser.
2. From the contextual menu, click Never put this site to sleep.

Microsoft Edge immediately updates your exclusion list in the background. The designated website will now remain fully energized in system memory indefinitely, ensuring uninterrupted real-time updates and active WebSocket connections.