Best Chrome Extension to Save and Share Tab Groups

If you rely on Chrome's tab groups to stay organized, you already know the frustration. You spend time color-coding and naming groups, then a crash, an update, or a closed window wipes them out. And when a teammate asks for that perfect set of research tabs, there's no built-in way to hand it over. The fix is a dedicated Chrome extension to save and share tab groups — one that keeps your group names and colors, restores them on demand, and lets you pass a whole group to someone else.

Why Chrome's built-in tab groups aren't enough

Native tab groups are great for organizing a live session. But they were designed as temporary, in-window state — not as a durable library you can save, back up, and share.

• They disappear. After a crash or unclean shutdown, Chrome often restores your tabs but drops the grouping, so your groups evaporate.

• Saved groups can silently un-save. Groups saved to the bookmarks bar can stop syncing or vanish during major Chrome updates.

• There's no real sharing. Chrome has no button to send a tab group to a colleague — you're stuck copying URLs by hand.

• No folders or archive. Groups live in the tab strip, not in an organized library you can revisit weeks later.

For the basics of the native feature, see our guides on how to save tab groups in Chrome and how to reopen tab groups in Chrome.

What makes a great save-and-share tab group extension

• Preserves group structure — keeps each group's name and color when saving and restoring.

• One-click restore — reopens the whole set as real Chrome tab groups, not a flat list of links.

• Easy sharing — lets you export a group and hand it to someone else.

• Cross-device sync — so your saved groups follow you between computers.

• Free and private — no paywall, and your data stays yours.

Tabox: the best Chrome extension to save and share tab groups

Tabox is a free, open-source extension built specifically for saving and sharing tab groups. It checks every box above.

• Keeps your groups intact. When you save the current window as a Collection, Tabox captures each native tab group's name and color. Restoring recreates those exact groups.

• Restores in one click. Hit play on any Collection to reopen all its tabs and groups in the current window or a new one.

• Organize with Folders. Group related Collections into color-coded Folders for projects, clients, or topics.

• Share by export and import. Export any Collection to a file and send it to a teammate; they import it and get the same tabs and groups. Because you send the file directly, nothing is posted to a public page.

• Sync with Google Drive. Turn on optional Google Drive sync to keep Collections in step across devices.

• Smart Organize (AI). Let Tabox's AI suggest tidy, named groups for a messy window, then apply them in a click.

• Free, open source, Chrome and Edge. No account required, no tracking.

How to save and share a tab group with Tabox

1. Install Tabox from the Chrome Web Store.

2. Open the tabs you want and arrange them into Chrome tab groups as usual.

3. Click the Tabox icon and choose Add Collection — your groups' names and colors are saved with it.

4. To share, open the Collection's menu and choose Export to File, then send the file to whoever needs it.

5. They import the file in their own Tabox and reopen the Collection — same tabs, same groups.

Prefer the manual route first? Our post on export and import tab groups walks through it.

Other tab group tools, briefly

• OneTab — great for freeing memory, but it flattens your tabs into a plain list and doesn't preserve group names or colors. Its share feature posts your list to a public OneTab web page.

• Session Buddy — a solid local session manager that added tab-group support, but it stores everything locally with no built-in cloud sync.

• Toby and Workona — powerful workspace suites, but they organize tabs in their own system rather than native Chrome groups, require an account, and gate key features behind paid plans.

The bottom line

If your priority is keeping tab groups safe and being able to share them, a dedicated extension beats Chrome's built-in feature every time. Tabox is the best free option to save and share tab groups with their names and colors intact. Add Tabox to Chrome and stop losing your groups.

FAQ

Does Chrome save tab groups permanently?

Not reliably. Chrome can restore tabs after closing, but groups are often lost after a crash or update. A dedicated extension like Tabox saves them as durable Collections.

Can you share a Chrome tab group with someone else?

Not natively. With Tabox you export a Collection to a file and send it; the other person imports it to get the same tabs and groups.

Is Tabox free?

Yes. Tabox is completely free and open source, with no account required.