How to Reopen Closed Tabs in Browsers?

it is common to work on multiple tabs on a browser. Most of the hyperlinks on webpages will also open in a new tab page on a browser. So when moving the mouse around you may accidentally close the tab which you need it. Also instead of closing the intended tabs, you might wrongly closed other tabs. in any case, mistakenly closing a browser tab is normal. In this article, we will explain you how to reopen closed tabs in browsers like Chrome, Firefox, Safari and Edge.

Reopen Closed Tabs in Browsers

There are many ways to reopen closed tabs in browsers:

1. Using keyboard shortcut
2. Accessing through menu
3. Opening closed tabs from history
4. By right clicking on new tab page
5. Reopening closed tabs on mobile browser versions.

We will explain all the above methods on Chrome, Firefox, Safari and Edge on desktop and mobile version wherever applicable.

1. Reopen Closed Tabs in Chrome

Press “Control + Shift + T” on Windows and “Command + Shift + T” on Mac using your keyboard to open the previously closed tab. You can press these shortcuts keys continuously to open the closed tabs in reverse chronological order.

In other way, just right click on the new tab page and choose “Reopen Closed Tab” option.

Navigate to “History” menu or go to “Settings > History” and choose the required sites under the “Recently Closed” section. You can also view the tabs opened in other devices if all the devices are connected in same network.

Go to “chrome://history/” and click on the previously viewed website.

On Chrome mobile browser, tap on the settings and then “Recent Tabs” to view the list of previously visited websites.

2. Reopen Closed Tabs in Firefox

Similar to Chrome, the process remains same in Firefox.

• Press “Control+ Shift + T” in Windows and “Command + Shift + T” in Mac to open previously closed tabs.
• Right click on the new tab page and choose “Undo Close Tab” option.

• Go to “History > Recently Closed Items” and choose the site you want to open. You can also simply restore the previous closed session of the browser.
• On Firefox mobile, tap on the history icon shown when the browser is opened and then tap on the “Recently Closed” option.

3. Reopen Closed Tabs in Safari

Safari is only used on Apple devices in macOS and iOS. On Mac do the followings to reopen the closed tab:

• Press “Command + Shift + T”.
• Go to the menu item “History > Recently Closed”.

On iOS devices like iPhone:

• Open Safari and tap on the “Tabs” icon to open new tab.
• Tap and hold on the “+” icon for long time.

• You will see the “Recently Closed Tabs” with the list of previously opened sites.

4. Reopen Closed Tabs in Edge

Edge is used on Microsoft Windows and does not have any mobile version. On Windows, use the same “Control + Shift + T” shortcut to reopen closed tabs in Edge.

You can also right click on the new tab and choose “Reopen closed tab” option.

When You Can’t Reopen Closed Tabs?

Browsers will open the closed tabs from the recorded history. So, even you closed the browser, just reopen and follow one of the above explained methods to reopen the previously visited tabs. But you can’t recover the closed tabs in following cases:

• You deleted the browser’s cache and browsing history. Since no history is available, reopen closed tab feature will not work.
• You have instructed browser not to remember and delete all the history when closing. For example, Edge offers an option “Always clear this when i close the browser”. You can clear the browsing history, cookies, cache and tabs you have recently closed when closing the browser. Ensure to switch off this option to reopen the closed tabs, otherwise there will be no way to do that once you have closed the browser.
• Logged in sites like banking sites record the session id for that particular tab session. Those sites will not allow you to reopen the closed tab for security reasons since the session will get closed when you close the tab. You will see session expired message and need to login again.
• When you are filling a form and closed the tab then you may not be able to get the form back with filled details. On Chrome, you will see error like “err_cache_miss” indicating the form data is not cached and you need to refill the data again.