[FEATURE] Horizontal tab bar for open sessions in Claude Code Desktop
Preflight Checklist
- [x] I have searched existing requests and this feature hasn't been requested yet
- [x] This is a single feature request (not multiple features)
Problem Statement
Problem
Claude Code Desktop manages sessions only through the left sidebar. When several
projects are in active use at the same time, the sidebar is the wrong tool for the job:
- Open sessions are stacked vertically among all past sessions, so the ones actually
in use are not visually separated from history.
- Switching requires moving focus to the side of the screen, scanning a list, and
clicking — instead of a single glance and a keystroke.
- There is no persistent, always-visible row showing "these are the things I have open".
- Worst of all, switching is two-level: first pick the mode (Code / Cowork), then find
the project inside that mode's list. Two separate switchers for one intention.
The sidebar works well as a session manager (browse history, resume old work).
It does not work well as a switcher between the sessions in active use.
These are two different needs, and one UI element is currently serving both.
Proposed Solution
Request
Add a horizontal tab bar at the top of the window for currently open sessions —
the same pattern used by browsers, VS Code, and virtually every editor:
- One tab per open session, labeled with the project/folder name, so tabs are
distinguishable at a glance.
- Tabs span both Code and Cowork sessions. This is the key point for multi-project
users: with a unified tab row, switching modes stops being a separate step — you click
the project you need and the app takes you there, whichever mode it belongs to.
A small mode indicator on each tab (icon or color) keeps it unambiguous.
- Keyboard switching: Ctrl+Tab / Ctrl+Shift+Tab for next/previous, Ctrl+1..9 to jump
to a specific tab.
- Drag to reorder, middle-click or Ctrl+W to close.
- Sidebar stays as-is for history and resuming — tabs are only for what is open now.
Optionally, make it a setting for people who prefer the current sidebar-only layout.
Why this matters
Tabs make the set of active work visible without any interaction: you see what is open,
in what order, and where you are, in one row. Right now the only way to see two sessions
at once is to run separate app instances and tile them with OS window snapping, which
doubles memory usage and splits the workflow across windows — and does nothing for the
mode-switching problem.
Related
- #30154 (multi-window support) — adjacent but different: that request is about several
windows side by side, this one is about fast switching inside a single window.
Both could coexist; tabs help even for users who never tile windows.
- #34768 — tab titles not distinguishable between sessions; naming tabs by project
would address the same underlying problem.
Environment
Claude Code Desktop on Windows 10 Pro.
Alternative Solutions
_No response_
Priority
High - Significant impact on productivity
Feature Category
Interactive mode (TUI)
Use Case Example
Real-world usage
I work on five projects at once — three in Code mode, two in Cowork mode — intensively,
for many hours a day. A single switch between two of them means: leave the current
session, change mode, scan the other mode's session list, click the right project.
Dozens of times per day, this is not just slow — it is genuinely tiring. The navigation
overhead competes with the actual work for attention, and by the end of a long day
the friction is what I remember.
This is exactly the problem tabs solved in editors and browsers decades ago: when you
juggle several documents, the set of open ones must be visible and reachable in one move.
Additional Context
_No response_