[Tip] How to Restart Google Chrome, Microsoft Edge and Opera Without Losing Tabs

In previous tutorial, we told you how to restart Mozilla Firefox web browser without losing any tab. Today in this tutorial, we’ll tell you how to restart Google Chrome, Opera and Microsoft Edge web browsers without losing tabs.

Many times when you install 3rd party extensions/add-ons or make some functionality changes, you need to restart the web browser to apply changes. If you have multiple tabs and windows opened in your web browser and you close and re-open the browser, you’ll lose all running tabs and windows. You’ll need to manually restore last session using browser options.

Restarting a web browser using built-in official methods prevents loss of running tabs and windows. When you restart a web browser using a built-in restart method, it closes the web browser and re-launches it with all previous running tabs and windows. So you get all your tabs and windows back even after a restart.

Google Chrome, Opera and Microsoft Edge browsers are based on Chromium browsing engine so they all provide similar features and functionality. There is a built-in URL which can be executed in the address bar to immediately restart Google Chrome, Microsoft Edge and Opera browsers without losing any tab.

If you also want to learn how to restart Google Chrome, Microsoft Edge and Opera browsers with all opened or running tabs, following methods will help you:

1. Restart Google Chrome Without Losing Tabs

Open Google Chrome browser and type following in address bar:

chrome://restart

It’ll immediately restart Google Chrome without any confirmation or alert. After restart all your running tabs or windows will be restored.

PS: If you want to bookmark this restart URL for quick and easy access, check out the BONUS TIP given at the end of the article.

2. Restart Opera Without Losing Tabs

Open Opera browser and type any of the following URLs in address bar:

chrome://restart
opera://restart

It’ll immediately restart Opera browser without any confirmation or alert. After restart all your running tabs or windows will be restored.

PS: If you want to bookmark this restart URL for quick and easy access, check out the BONUS TIP given below.

3. Restart Microsoft Edge Without Losing Tabs

Open Microsoft Edge browser and type any of the following URLs in address bar:

chrome://restart
edge://restart

It’ll immediately restart Microsoft Edge browser without any confirmation or alert. After restart all your running tabs or windows will be restored.

PS: If you want to bookmark this restart URL for quick and easy access, check out the BONUS TIP given below.

BONUS TIP:

If you want to bookmark this URL to quickly and easily restart Google Chrome, Microsoft Edge or Opera browser any time, you’ll notice that these URLs don’t show any page, so you can’t bookmark them.

But you can manually add these URLs as bookmarks using your browser’s bookmarks manager as mentioned in following steps:

In Google Chrome, type chrome://bookmarks/ in address bar to launch bookmarks manager. You can also access it using Ctrl+Shift+O hotkey. Now right-click and select “Add new bookmark” option. Give any name and type chrome://restart in URL section. Click on Save button to create the bookmark.

In Microsoft Edge, type chrome://bookmarks/ or edge://bookmarks or edge://favorites in address bar to launch bookmarks manager. You can also access it using Ctrl+Shift+O hotkey. Now right-click and select “Add favorite” option. Give any name and type edge://restart in URL section. Click on Save button to create the bookmark.

In Opera, type chrome://bookmarks/ or opera://bookmarks/ in address bar to launch bookmarks manager. You can also access it using Ctrl+Shift+B hotkey. Now copy chrome://restart or opera://restart URL and right-click in bookmarks manager and select “Paste” option. Alternatively, you can press Ctrl+V hotkey to paste the URL. It’ll create a bookmark for Restart function.

Another way is bookmark any web page, edit the bookmark and change the URL to chrome://restart. Done.

Now you need to just click on the bookmark button present in the bookmarks bar to restart your web browser quickly and easily using a simple click.