Enabling This Microsoft Edge Browser Feature Could Extend Your Laptop’s Battery Life

by Brandon Hill — Friday, September 18, 2020, 12:47 PM EDT

When it comes to modern web browsers, Microsoft’s Chromium-based Edge browser is already pretty energy efficient compared to its peers; especially compared to Google Chrome. However, Microsoft is working on a new feature that could further improve your runtimes for those of you with laptops.

Microsoft is introducing what it calls Sleeping Tabs, which in effect will suspend any of your inactive tabs that are lingering around in the background. By suspending activity, the hope is that resources will be freed up, thus improving the overall efficiency of the Edge browser.

However, in order to access this new feature, you need to be running the experimental Canary version of the Edge browser (version 87.0.643.0). And once you download Edge Canary, you will still need to enable the feature with a flag, as described by Techdows, using the following steps:

Launch the Edge Canary web browser
Navigate to edge://flags page
Search for “Enable Sleeping Tabs”
Click the dropdown arrow and select “Enabled”
Restart Edge Canary

After you have restarted your browser, you can then navigate to Edge Canary’s Settings menu, and go to System. You should now see that the Sleeping Tabs setting has been enabled under "Save Resources". Not only can you enable/disable the feature from here, but you can also set the amount of time that must elapse before an inactive tab is put to sleep. You can even setup an exception for websites that you specifically don't want to be put to sleep. Overall, Microsoft is giving you some nice granular control over the feature, which is nice.

We should reemphasize that this feature is only currently enabled in the Edge Canary channel, and has not yet been ported over to the Edge Stable channel. Considering that the Edge Stable channel is currently sitting on version 85, it will still be a while before the general public can enjoy this feature with the browser.

Tags: Microsoft, (nasdaq:msft), microsoft edge, edge canary

Brandon Hill

Brandon received his first PC, an IBM Aptiva 310, in 1994 and hasn’t looked back since. He cut his teeth on computer building/repair working at a mom and pop computer shop as a plucky teen in the mid 90s and went on to join AnandTech as the Senior News Editor in 1999. Brandon would later help to form DailyTech where he served as Editor-in-Chief from 2008 until 2014. Brandon is a tech geek at heart, and family members always know where to turn when they need free tech support. When he isn’t writing about the tech hardware or studying up on the latest in mobile gadgets, you’ll find him browsing forums that cater to his long-running passion: automobiles.

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