If you use Firefox and have ever lost your tabs after a crash, needed to organize work across multiple projects, or wanted to switch browser contexts without losing progress — Tab Manager & Session Saver is worth knowing about.
What It Does
Tab Manager & Session Saver is a Firefox extension that saves and restores named browser sessions. A "session" is a snapshot of your open tabs at a point in time.
Core workflow:
- Open tabs for a project/task
- Save as "project-name" session
- Close those tabs, open different ones
- Restore "project-name" session when returning
Unlike Firefox's built-in session restore (which restores the last session on startup), this lets you manage multiple named sessions simultaneously and restore any of them at will.
Why Tabs Get Out of Control
The pattern is familiar: you open a few tabs for research → each tab spawns related tabs → you have 30+ tabs that feel important but aren't all immediately relevant. Switching contexts means either keeping everything open (slow, visually overwhelming) or closing and losing track.
Session-based management addresses this by making tab organization explicit rather than accumulating.
Installation
Available at: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/tab-manager-and-session-saver/
Free, no account required, no data leaves your browser.
Basic Usage
Saving a session: Click the extension icon → name the session → Save. All open tabs in the current window are captured.
Restoring a session: Click the extension icon → select session → Restore. Opens the session tabs in the current window (replacing current tabs) or in a new window.
Viewing saved sessions: The extension popup lists all saved sessions with tab counts and last-saved time.
Deleting sessions: Sessions you no longer need can be deleted from the popup.
Common Workflows
Multiple Work Projects
Keep separate named sessions per project:
- "client-acme-frontend" — tabs for the frontend work
- "client-acme-backend" — tabs for API/backend
- "learning-rust" — documentation tabs while working through a project
Switch between them as your focus shifts. Each session preserves the exact tabs, including scroll position on some tabs.
Research Sessions
When researching a topic, you accumulate many browser tabs. Save them as "research-topic-name" before closing. Return to the research session days or weeks later exactly where you left off.
Homelab / Sysadmin
Multiple browser sessions for different systems:
- "homelab-monitoring" — Grafana, Prometheus, uptime dashboards
- "homelab-network" — pfSense, Unifi, router admin
- "client-server-config" — specific server management panels
Switch to the right context without hunting through browser history.
Pre-Meeting Prep
Before a meeting with specific agenda items open in the browser:
- Open all relevant tabs (project board, documents, notes)
- Save as "meeting-2024-10-16"
- Restore when meeting starts
Context is instantly available without manually re-finding everything.
Session Persistence
Sessions are stored locally in Firefox's extension storage. They persist across:
- Firefox restarts
- System reboots
- Firefox updates
They're not automatically synced across devices (sessions are per-browser-instance). If you work on multiple computers, the sessions are separate on each.
Combining with Other Firefox Features
With containers: Open a specific container with saved session tabs. Tab Manager saves all tabs regardless of container assignment.
With Firefox Sync: Sessions aren't synced, but your bookmarks and history are. Useful as complementary systems.
With Reader Mode: Sessions save about:reader?url=... links properly, so Reader Mode tabs restore in Reader Mode.
What It Doesn't Do
- Doesn't save tab position on page: Scroll position is preserved on some sites, not all.
- Doesn't sync across devices: Sessions are local only.
- Doesn't automatically save: You manually save sessions when you want to capture the current state.
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Doesn't recover from browser crash: Use Firefox's built-in session restore (
about:sessionrestore) for crash recovery. Tab Manager is for intentional session management.
Comparison with Firefox's Built-in Features
Firefox has its own session restoration (restores last session on startup). The difference:
- Firefox's restore: one session, always the most recent
- Tab Manager: multiple named sessions, any can be restored at will
Firefox also has "bookmark all tabs to folder" — this saves URLs but not window state, and you have to manually open a folder to get them back. Tab Manager is designed for the restore workflow specifically.
Privacy Note
All session data is stored in local Firefox extension storage. The extension doesn't connect to external servers. Your tab URLs and session names stay on your device.
The source code is available for inspection via AMO's review process (which requires unobfuscated code for all Firefox extensions).
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