As expected, Google has pushed a new update to Chrome 78 stable to re-add removed close other tabs option. The “Chrome 78.0.3904.0.108” update also includes 5 security fixes. To stay protected, launch Chrome, click on the help menu and check for updates to download and install the update.
The changelog mentions about reverting the popular tab context menu option Chrome has lost recently. Chromium employee notes in the bug that the option has been removed but they reconsidered the change after hearing user feedback and he accepts, Chrome UI doesn’t offer any other way to close other tabs (we’ve covered an extension) in the browser.
‘Close other tabs’ was removed following the discussion here https://bugs.chromium.org/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=515930. With further consideration, which included additional usage analysis and listening to user feedback, we decided to restore ‘Close other tabs’ to the tab context menu. Folks who use this feature can’t efficiently take this action any other way from Chrome’s UI.
Here is what happened: after analyzing users tab context menu options data usage, the Chromium team came to a conclusion to ditch Close other tabs and they have done that.
According to Google, the close other tabs option was used only by 2% of users. They also moved “bookmark all tabs” and Reopen closed tab to frame window, which appears when you right-click on it. There is also criticism from users to add Reopen Close tab option back, but you should know you can restore the last closed tab by using Ctrl+Shift+ T shortcut. The Chrome team now argues the option is there in the window frame for you to access.
