TabFlick – Most-recently-used tab switcher with global search
A menu bar tool for Arc-to-Chrome switchers that picks tabs by recent use and searches everything
- Problem
- A user who moved from Arc back to Chrome hated that ⌃⇥ cycles tabs in tab-bar order, and Chrome extensions cannot bind Tab-containing shortcuts, so they built a menu bar app plus extension themselves. This shows that tab switching and search is a high-frequency, unmet native pain, especially for heavy tab users.
- Solution
- A cross-platform menu bar/tray app paired with a browser extension over local WebSocket: switch tabs by most-recently-used order, hold a modifier to show thumbnails, and provide ⌘E global search across tabs, bookmarks, and history.
- Users
- Heavy browser tab users, Arc-to-Chrome migrants, developers juggling multiple projects
- MVP
- macOS menu bar app communicating with a Chrome extension; switch tabs by MRU order; hold a hotkey to show thumbnails; global search across tabs, bookmarks, and history; exclude certain windows
- Revenue
- One-time purchase or annual subscription; free tier limits tab count or search results, paid unlocks full features and multi-browser support
- Why now
- After Arc stopped active development, many users returned to Chrome and find native switching poor, while extension API limits create an opening for a menu bar app. Indie developers can ship quickly.