What the Tab Automation side panel does

Tab Automation is controlled from Chrome’s side panel. Active Jobs and custom automations in Library are free. An Explorer License unlocks the full Dashboard. Google Search is coming soon, including for licensed users. Create an automation, choose where it should run, arrange its steps, and click Save & Run.

For details about any control, use the steps reference. It covers every Add Step item, plus Values, Repeat, and Activity.

Create an automation

Click New Automation at the bottom of the panel. In Add New, give it a name and description, then choose where it should run under Tab & Startup.

Always start this automation in a new tab is on by default. Leave it on to open the Start URL in a new tab, or turn it off and select an existing tab. The Start card stores the starting URL.

Build the sequence with Add Step. A simple timer uses Refresh Page and Repeat. A link walk uses For Each Link with steps inside Each Link.

Add Step inserts the actions that run on that page, including:

Save Page — retain rendered or source HTML and inspect its metadata
Save Text — retain named text fields as dataset rows
Save Images — save selected page images for later download
For Each Link — collect http(s) URLs from a page, pasted list, or XML sitemap and run the inner steps on each
Click Element — click, hover, double-click, or right-click a picked button, link, checkbox, or tab
Refresh Page — reload whichever page this tab is on
Scroll Page — move to the top, the bottom, by a distance, or to a picked element
Go To Web Page — open a saved http(s) URL, or go back or forward, in the same tab
Type Text — fill a picked input
Press Key — press Escape, Tab, Enter, Space, or an arrow key
Wait / Delay — pause for a duration or wait Until a page condition is true
If / Else — compare a value, then run Then or Else
Save Value — read an element into a Values name
Hide Element — hide a picked element on this page
Take a Screenshot — retain a PNG of the visible area in Results or enable Full page to include content below the fold
Download File — retain an http(s) file in Results
Send Alert — OS notification, sound, or a webhook to Slack, Discord, ntfy, or any HTTPS endpoint when this step runs. Each Send Alert picks its own destinations. Test on an output fires only that output.

Values is the sheet section above Steps, not an Add Step item. Start is the first card; Repeat is the End bookend. Repeat is off for new automations. Turn it on for unlimited cycles, a cycle count, or Stop after a duration. Each cycle and When it stops have the same Test buttons. Activity is the run log on each automation card.

On Add New, Save writes a Yours recipe without starting it. Test runs one cycle without creating a saved tab automation; save steps retain labeled Test output in the Dashboard. Save & Run writes the recipe, creates a job, and starts it. Run is the play control on Yours and on a running sheet header.

Library and a running job

Library sits under Active Jobs. Yours holds recipes you save. Pre-built contains workflows built for a specific site.

Click an Active Job to open Details, then choose Edit in Library to edit its saved recipe. If it has no Library entry yet, that action creates one. Saving changes to a recipe does not change the automation already running on a tab; run the edited recipe to use them.

Read and control a run

Each Active Job row shows its current phase and the controls available for that state. Use Pause, Resume, or Restart for one automation. The bulk controls are Pause All, Resume All, and Remove All.

Open Activity to inspect the current or earlier run: collection, target, step, cycle, and watch outcomes are recorded there. If an assigned tab closes, Restore can reopen its saved URL.

The gear in the panel header opens Settings. Language is Match Chrome or a shipped UI language: English, Japanese, German, Spanish, French, Portuguese (Brazil), Korean, Chinese (Traditional), or Chinese (Simplified). The side panel, notifications, and picker follow that choice. The toolbar title still follows Chrome. Translations are a best effort — we will keep improving them. The export folder setting suggests the Downloads subfolder used when you explicitly download retained files. Webhook destinations (Slack, Discord, ntfy, or any HTTPS URL) are also created there.

Show automation status on tab icons is on by default in Settings. Assigned tabs show a blue play badge while running, including scheduled waits, and an amber pause badge while paused. Turning the setting off restores their website icons without pausing the automations. Read about tab status indicators.

Workflows

The side panel also previews pre-built Workflows for a specific site. Google Search is coming soon and cannot yet be opened or run, even with Explorer. See the workflows reference. Today that is Google Search.

Choose a practical guide

Review retained results

Click Dashboard in the panel header to browse Saved results, Pages & SEO, Run history, and Downloads. Save steps retain output locally; download it when ready. Removing an automation preserves its results. The Dashboard guide explains previews, exports, storage, and deletion.

Review saved page metadata

Dashboard → Pages & SEO combines Save Page captures and sources visited by the Google Search workflow. Pages appear first; use View → By run or By domain to group them. Open a capture to inspect title tags, meta descriptions, headings and other on-page declarations with its capture time and originating run. Metadata is collected automatically; Google source visits still need to be enabled. Export selected runs, domains, page captures, or all filtered captures as JSON, CSV or Markdown. Capture failures and incomplete inspection remain labeled.