Ever run into Chrome crashing or shutting down unexpectedly? It’s pretty annoying, especially if you had a bunch of tabs open and suddenly they’re all gone. Sometimes it happens after an update, sometimes just because Chrome gets a bit too eager to “close itself” without warning. If that’s your pain point, don’t worry — there are a few ways to get those tabs back without losing your mind.
This guide covers some practical methods to restore your tabs — from simple shortcuts to extensions that save your session progress, so you’re not restarting from scratch every time Chrome decides to freak out. Expect to recover closed tabs easier, and maybe even prevent future frustrations by setting Chrome to reopen your last session automatically.
How to Fix Lost Tabs in Chrome After a Crash or Closure
Reopen Closed Tabs with History
This is the quickest hack if Chrome crashed or you accidentally closed a tab. When that happens, Chrome keeps track of your last session, so you can get your tabs back without much fuss. On Windows, hit CTRL + H — that’ll open Chrome’s History. On Mac, it’s CMD + Y. Sometimes, you might see a list under “Recently closed” — just click those and boom, your tabs are back.
It’s kind of weird, but on some setups, this doesn’t always restore everything perfectly. If Chrome was closed forcefully or crashed hard, this might only work if you’ve got the history saved up or something. Still, worth trying first.
Recover Using Keyboard Shortcut to Reopen Tabs
If you wanna go a little faster, this trick’s a classic. When Chrome closes a tab (even if it crashes), pressing CTRL + Shift + T on Windows (or CMD + Shift + T on Mac) will reopen your last session — often including all those tabs you just lost. It’s kind of like a “undo close tab” command that works for the whole window sometimes.
On some occasions, you might need to repeat it if you had multiple tabs closed, because each press keeps adding the last session back. It’s not perfect, but it’s saved my butt a few times. Also, right-click on your tabs or the tab bar and choose “Reopen closed tab” if that’s an option — but it’s only for individual tabs, not all at once.
Use a Session Management Extension: TabCloud
Say you’re paranoid about losing tabs, or need to switch machines often. Check out TabCloud. It’s a free extension that lets you save sessions, restore them later, and even sync across devices. Not super complicated, but on one setup it failed the first few times, then magically worked after a browser restart.
Once installed, you can save your current set of tabs, give it a name, and restore later if Chrome crashes…or if you just want to switch devices without losing everything. Handy if you juggle multiple workspaces or have a browser crash mid-work.
Workona – Advanced Tab Management
If managing dozens of tabs is your thing, Workona (check this out) is a good option. It’s a popular extension among productivity buffs and over 200, 000 people use it to organize, save, and restore sessions, even syncing across devices.
It has a feature called Secure Backups — basically, it saves your tab groups automatically, so if Chrome crashes, you get a prompt to restore everything later. Comes in handy when Chrome acts weird or you want a more structured way of handling those chaos-filled browsing sessions.
Trying Chrome History Manually
If nothing else worked, maybe it’s time to dig into Chrome’s own history. Under Menu > History, you’ll see all your visited pages. You can re-open tabs individually, but it’s not perfect for restoring sessions with multiple tabs. Still, it’s better than nothing — especially if you remember the sites you lost and want to revisit them one by one.
Heads up, though: this method re-loads pages fresh, so any state or form info might be gone, but at least you’re not starting from scratch.
Enable the “Continue where you left off” Setting for Future Prevention
To avoid this headache in the future, Chrome has a built-in setting. Go to Settings > On Startup and select Continue where you left off. This makes Chrome automatically reopen the tabs from your last session whenever you launch the browser. Just toggle that on, and on restart or crash, your open tabs should come back, mostly intact.
Of course, this isn’t a magic fix if Chrome crashes unexpectedly — sometimes it still won’t recover everything. It’s more of a preventive step than a solution after the fact, but definitely worth doing.
Summary
- Try the shortcut CTRL + Shift + T to reopen last session.
- Check Chrome’s history (CTRL + H) for lost tabs.
- Install session managers like TabCloud or Workona for better session handling.
- Set Chrome to “Continue where you left off” for smoother future recovery.
Wrap-up
Dealing with lost tabs might still be a pain, but these tricks cover most scenarios. Sometimes a reboot or a quick extension fix can make Chrome behave better, especially if crashes are frequent. Not sure why it works sometimes and not others, but mixing these methods has saved a lot of headaches. Fingers crossed this helps — and hopefully, next time Chrome crashes, at least you’re a little more prepared.