Tab suspender · Free · No tracking
The Great Suspender is gone.
Here's a safe replacement.
TabInsights does what you actually used The Great Suspender for — automatically suspends idle tabs, frees up RAM, and restores them in one click — without the part that got it removed. No account, no servers, nothing tracked. Everything runs on your device.
What happened to The Great Suspender?
The Great Suspender was one of the most popular tab-management extensions on Chrome, with millions of users. It suspended tabs you weren't using so they'd release their memory back to your system.
In 2020, the original developer sold the extension to an unknown party. In early 2021, the new maintainer pushed an update containing code that was flagged as malicious, and Google forcibly removed it from the Chrome Web Store and disabled it on users' machines. Overnight, millions of people lost a tool they relied on daily — and understandably, a lot of them no longer trust "just install another random suspender."
The part that actually matters: trust
The Great Suspender's problem wasn't the idea — it was that an extension with deep access changed hands quietly and turned on its users. TabInsights is built the opposite way: it has no account, no server, and makes zero external network requests during normal use. Your browsing data never leaves your device because there's nowhere for it to go. You can read exactly what it does and why in the privacy policy.
How TabInsights replaces it
The Memory Saver built into TabInsights does the same core job you relied on:
Automatic suspension
Set a timeout — say 30 minutes — and any tab you haven't touched since then is suspended automatically, freeing roughly 50 MB of RAM per tab. No manual clicking.
One-click restore, nothing lost
A suspended tab stays right where it was in your tab bar as a lightweight placeholder, and reloads exactly where you left off the moment you click it.
Whitelist and smart skips
Add sites that should never suspend (your email, a running dashboard), and pinned or audio-playing tabs are skipped automatically.
The Great Suspender vs TabInsights
| The Great Suspender | TabInsights | |
|---|---|---|
| Auto-suspend idle tabs | Yes | Yes |
| One-click restore | Yes | Yes |
| Whitelist sites | Yes | Yes |
| Available on Chrome Web Store | Removed (2021) | Yes |
| Actively maintained | No | Yes |
| No account / no tracking | Compromised | Yes — all on-device |
| Also blocks distractions, tracks time, Pomodoro | No | Yes, built in |
| Price | Free | Free |
You're not just getting a suspender back — TabInsights also includes a website blocker, a Pomodoro focus timer, automatic time tracking, and tab decluttering, all in one extension. If all you want is the memory saver, that works on its own too.
Curious how much memory your tabs are actually costing you right now? Try the free Chrome RAM calculator.