If you have used Windows or Linux, then you know about the Alt + Tab switcher hotkey that can be used to switch from one Windows application to another. Starting from Windows Vista, the Alt+Tab switcher has started to display the opened windows in a 3D mode. If you want to similar functionality for the tabs opened inside your Firefox web browser, then you can use the FoxTab add-on. It lets you switch to different tabs easily using an interactive 3D mode switcher. Not only that, you can also view your recently closed tabs and switch to them if you want.
You can download and install the FoxTab addon for Firefox from the Mozilla add-ons repository. The installation of this add-on requires you to restart the Firefox browser. After the restart, you would notice a new icon in the Firefox toolbar. Clicking on this icon would immediately launch the FoxTab Tab Switcher from where you can switch through the tabs either by using the up-down keys on your keyboard or through your mouse’s scroll wheel. Here you can choose the background color and grid orientation for the thumbnails.
However, if you see a blank page, then you need to configure the settings for FoxTab add-on. You can open the options for the FoxTab from the Firefox add-ons page (about:addons). In the settings, you can decide the hotkey to launch FoxTab, the size of the FoxTab tab switcher (full screen, fit to browser, large panel or small panel) etc. If you are seeing blank screen when launching FoxTab, then try choosing the small panel size. You can also choose how many grids, columns and visible tabs are to be displayed.
FoxTab can also replace your new tab page in Firefox. After installing FoxTab for the first time, if you open a new tab, it asks for enabling the FoxTab as the new tab page. You can also choose this option from the FoxTab settings. In the FoxTab new tab page, it displays the top sites visited by you in a 4×4 grid. You can add any link or webpage manually to the top sites, by right-clicking on a link or on a webpage and selecting Add to Top Sites as shown in the following picture.
If you do not want to click from one tab to another just to switch to a website that you opened earlier, then its time you install the FoxTab add-on. If you are using FoxTab, then switching to tabs is as easy as using the hotkey Ctrl+Q, using the up-down keys to locate a tab and then pressing the Enter key to switch to it.
You can install FoxTab from https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/foxtab/.