2 Easy Ways To Mute Tabs on Google Chrome

Muting specific tabs is an essential feature of Chrome when you need to listen to something in another tab or are unable to mute audio from a website from the interface. Currently, Chrome only allows you to mute the volume of specific websites, not specific tabs. This means if you have multiple pages open from the same website, then the mute feature will disable audio on all the tabs.

Furthermore, it’s also a bit inconvenient to right-click and mute tabs. Therefore, today I am going to show you two ways to mute tabs on Chrome so you could mute the audio of individual tabs even if they have the same website open and also do it in a convenient way. Keep reading…

1. Mute individual tabs in Chrome

Although this functionality was available in Chrome as a flag, it got removed with Chrome 71 in support of the “Mute site” feature that we have today in Chrome. Fortunately, you can get this feature back with the help of a Chrome extension that will mute a tab regardless of which website you have opened in it.

For this purpose, I like the Mute Tab Chrome extension because it is very easy to use and completely free. Just install the extension and go to the tab you want to mute. Here either click on the Mute Tab extension button or right-click anywhere and select “Mute tab” from the context menu.

This will mute the specific tab and add an “M” sign on the extension button letting you know it’s muted. You can go through the same process again to unmute a tab.

Interestingly, you can also mute a tab even if no audio is running on it. This can be useful if you want to prevent any audio from coming from a tab before the audio even plays.

2. Mute tabs in Chrome using shortcuts

If you want an even more convenient way to mute tabs in Chrome, then a shortcut is perfect. With the help of a keyboard shortcut, you won’t have to even move your hands to the mouse to mute a tab. Mute Tab Shortcuts is a Chrome extension that will add the functionality to mute tabs using custom shortcuts. Not only that, but it will also add shortcuts that will disable tabs in different ways, for example, muting all the tabs except the current one.

Install the extension and you can use one of the below-mentioned shortcuts to mute a tab.

Alt + Shift + M – Mute/unmute the current tab
Alt + Shift + N – Mute all the tabs except the current one
Alt + Shift + Comma (,) – Mute/unmute all the tabs

Once one of the tabs is successfully muted, a crossed speaker icon will show on the tab, but only while an audio file is playing. You can also change the keyboard shortcuts from the Chrome extensions menu if you don’t like the above-mentioned ones.

You can also mute tabs before playing any audio in it. However, you won’t see a muted sign if no audio is running.

Wrapping up

I think the Mute Tab extension will be more than enough for most users as you won’t have to remember any shortcuts or configure them. It also shows if a tab is muted or not even while no audio is running in the tab. Although, if you love using shortcuts, then Mute Tab Shortcuts is definitely worth using as you’ll be able to immediately mute tabs without the need to reach for the mouse.