Opening the sidebar
Click the Tab Valet icon (P parking sign) in the Chrome toolbar to toggle the sidebar open or closed. You can also use Chrome's built-in side panel button near the top-right of the browser window.
Restoring a parked tab
Click the tab's title in the sidebar to restore it. The tab reopens in your browser and is removed from the parked list.
Dismissing a parked tab
Hover over a parked tab and click the ✕ button to dismiss it. Dismissing removes the tab from your parked list without archiving it. Use this for tabs you no longer need.
Archiving a parked tab
Hover over a parked tab and click the warehouse icon to archive it immediately. Archived tabs are saved to your browser bookmarks and can be reopened at any time. See Archiving Tabs for more.
Snoozing a parked tab
Snooze a tab to defer it until a specific future time. When the timer fires, the tab reappears in the sidebar ready to reopen — without cluttering your tab strip in the meantime.
To snooze: hover over any parked tab and click the clock icon. Choose a preset (Later, Tomorrow, This Weekend, Next Week) or enter a custom date and time. You can also snooze any open tab by right-clicking the page and choosing Tab Valet → Snooze Tab. See Snoozed Tabs for a full guide.
The "Coming Back" section
Snoozed tabs waiting for their wake time appear in the Coming Back section, below the Parked section in the sidebar. Tabs are sorted soonest first. Each row shows the title, domain, and scheduled wake time (e.g., "Tomorrow · 9:00 AM"). To cancel a snooze, hover over the tab and click the ✕.
The "Ready" section
When a snoozed tab's timer fires, it moves to the Ready section — highlighted in amber with a Ready badge. Click the tab title to open it immediately. Hover to re-snooze it for a later time or dismiss it permanently.
Comfortable view and compact view
Use the view toggle in the top-right of the sidebar header to switch between two layouts:
| View | What it shows |
|---|---|
| Comfortable (default) | Larger cards with favicon, title, domain, status label, and a short description snippet. Action buttons appear on hover. |
| Compact | Condensed single-line rows. Click any row to expand it and reveal actions. Hover to see a preview tooltip. |
Status labels
Each parked tab shows a status label indicating how recently you used it:
- Active today — you visited this tab today before it was parked
- Idle 2d (or similar) — the tab has been idle for approximately that many days
Duplicate tabs
If you have multiple tabs open for the same website, Tab Valet groups them into a single entry with a ×N badge (e.g., ×3 tabs). In compact view, click the entry to expand it. You'll see a Merge option to consolidate the duplicates.
The parking notification
When a tab is parked, a dark notification banner slides in at the top of the sidebar showing which tab was parked. It stays for 8 seconds, then dismisses itself.
- Click Undo next to a tab to immediately restore it
- If multiple tabs were parked at once, click Undo all to restore them all
- Click the ✕ to dismiss the notification early
The extension icon badge
When you have parked tabs, an amber dot appears on the Tab Valet icon in the Chrome toolbar. Hover over the icon to see the exact count (e.g., "Tab Valet · 5 parked").