01 — Provenance
It remembers why
Every page arrives with its cause attached: the link you followed, the phrase you highlighted, the search you ran. A branching trail with reasons on the edges — not a list of URLs.
Chrome extension · nothing leaves your browser
Never lose the thread.
Twenty tabs deep, you can no longer say which page led to which, or why you opened that one. ContextTab has been keeping the trail the whole time — and hands it back as a map you can read, park and export.
- 01 No account to start Install it and the map begins.
- 02 Nothing is uploaded The trail lives in your browser.
- 03 Free tier, for good Not a countdown to a paywall.
A working demonstration
Today's trail
6 live · 0 parked
Selected
Kubernetes memory leaks
The root of this trail — where the question started.
The real thing, in miniature. Nothing here is sent anywhere.
What it actually does
Three things, and nothing else.
Not a bookmark manager. Not a tab suspender. A record of how you got here.
02 — Memory
It parks what you are not reading
Freeze a branch and its tabs are discarded from memory but kept on the map, with their notes and scroll position. Thaw one and it comes back exactly where you left it.
03 — Handover
It hands you a document
One click turns a branch — or the whole session — into Markdown, with the trail, your highlights, your notes and a source list. Ready to paste into a doc, an issue, or your notebook.
How it feels
Four gestures. That is the whole interface.
Showing keys for
Alt+hover a link
See where it goes, and branch before you leave
The trail is drawn before the page loads.
select any text
Highlight it, note it, or search it as a new branch
Three choices in an arc under the cursor.
Shift+click
Read it beside the page, not over it
No new tab, no lost place.
Alt+Shift+D
The whole trail, at the edge of the page
And out of the way again when you are done.
There is more underneath — parked branches, due dates, search across everything, tab groups, ten colour modes. What ContextTab is, in full →
Where your browsing goes
Nowhere.
That is the whole answer, and it is worth being precise about.
The map is local
Titles, URLs, notes, highlights and the shape of the trail live in your browser's own storage. There is no sync server, and no code path that could add one.
The account knows one thing
Signing in answers exactly one question — is this account entitled? The server stores a salted hash of your Google id, your email address, your subscription status and the dates. Never a page you visited. Itemised in full →
AI uses your own key
Summaries go straight from your browser to whichever provider you chose, with a key encrypted at rest under a passphrase only you know. Neither the key nor the text passes through us.
Pricing
Free for good. Pro when you want more.
Everything about how the dock looks and works is free, always. The subscription covers three things.
Basic
Free · always
No account, no card, no expiry.
- Lineage tracking up to 30 pages
- Parking, thawing and search
- Every part of the interface
- Markdown and JSON export
Pro
$3.99 a month
or $44.99 a year — $3.75 a month, about 6% less
Pro needs a Google sign-in — that is how a plan follows you to another machine. Signing in starts the free trial, and no card is taken to start one. After that a subscription renews automatically, monthly or yearly, until you cancel; the price in your currency, including any tax, is shown at checkout before anything is charged. Cancel in one click at any time — access lasts to the end of the period you paid for, then the account moves to Basic.
- No ceiling on the map, and trees merged across windows
- Notes on pages, with due dates and checklists
- AI summaries using your own API key
- Ten more colour modes, dark and light
Getting started
Three minutes. No account to start.
Install the extension
Chrome, Brave, Edge, Arc, Vivaldi — anything Chromium. It starts drawing your trail immediately: Basic needs no account and no card. Pro is the one thing that does, and only when you want it.
Open the dock
- Windows, Linux, ChromeOS
- Alt+Shift+D
- macOS
- ⌥ Option+⇧ Shift+D
It is one shortcut, not two: Chrome maps Alt to ⌥ on a Mac, where the key is printed Option.
Or click the ContextTab icon in the toolbar. On a Mac it often starts hidden — click the puzzle piece at the right of the address bar and pin ContextTab. If something else has already taken the shortcut, change it at chrome://extensions/shortcuts.
Sign in when you want Pro
One click with Google. That starts the free trial, and your plan follows the account to any machine.
Questions people actually ask
Answered plainly.
Does ContextTab send my browsing anywhere?
No. Titles, URLs, notes and the shape of the trail live in your browser's own storage. There is no sync server. Signing in answers one question — is this account entitled — and the server stores a salted hash of your Google id, your subscription status and the dates. Never a page you visited.
How is this different from a bookmark manager?
A bookmark records that a page exists. ContextTab records why you opened it: the link you followed, the phrase you highlighted, the search you ran. The result is a branching trail with reasons on the edges, not a flat list of URLs.
Which browsers does it work in?
Any Chromium browser — Chrome, Brave, Edge, Arc, Vivaldi and Opera. Sign-in uses the standard web flow rather than a Chrome-only one.
What happens when I cancel?
You keep Pro until the end of the period you have already paid for — that is what the money bought. After that the map falls back to 30 pages and everything else keeps working.
Do I need an account to use it?
Not for Basic — no account, no card, and it never expires. Pro is the exception: it needs a Google sign-in, because a subscription has to be attached to something in order to follow you to another machine. So: free without an account, paid with one.
Does the subscription renew by itself?
Yes — monthly or yearly, whichever you chose, at the price shown at checkout, until you cancel. Cancelling is one click in Settings → Manage billing and takes effect at the end of the period you have already paid for. See the terms for refunds and, if you are in the UK or the EU, your 14-day withdrawal right.
Your research already has a shape.
ContextTab is just the first thing that draws it.