switching to left/upper tab is not working with shortcuts, but working if the tabs are pinned. via APIs may be couse i am uging surfing keys extension but reported here just in case.

[Mukulkalsait]

Preliminary Checks

• I have read and understood the important section above.
• I have searched existing issues and avoided creating duplicates.
• I am not filing an enhancement request.
• I have checked that this issue cannot be reproduced on Mozilla Firefox.
• I have checked that this issue can be reproduced once I removed all my Mods and Custom CSS.

What happened?

something in tab switching is broken, i dont know what, but i can see shortcuts that used to switch between tabs back and forth are not working properly while back tab is not working front tab takes 2 tabs ahead, but this only happen with normal tab, if multiple tabs are pinned and i try to do back and forth it works properly like it used to do before, for the info i am using "surfing keys" and shortcuts are "E" for back tab and "R" for next tab.

Expected behavior

tabs should switch back and forth.

Actual behavior

back tab is not working while forth tab skips 1 tab and goes ahead.

Steps to reproduce

i was using surfing keys, so install it and use keys like E and R to to back and forth in the tabs, which is broken. but same time this works if we pinned multyple tabs and then we try to do the same.

Screenshots and videos

No response

Version

1.14.11b

What platform are you seeing the problem on?

Windows - aarch64, Windows - x64

What component is this issue related to?

Tabs

Relevant log output if applicable

[dosubot]

Hi, @Mukulkalsait. I'm Dosu, and I'm helping the desktop team manage their backlog and am marking this issue as stale.

Issue Summary:

• You reported that Surfing Keys extension's tab switching shortcuts (E for back, R for next) malfunction on Windows version 1.14.11b.
• Specifically, the back shortcut does not work, and the next shortcut skips a tab.
• This issue affects normal tabs but does not affect pinned tabs.
• There have been no further comments or updates on this issue.

Next Steps:

• Please let me know if this issue is still relevant with the latest version of the desktop app by commenting here.
• If I do not hear back within 10 days, I will automatically close this issue.

Thank you for your understanding and contribution!

[Mukulkalsait]

Hi, @Mukulkalsait. I'm Dosu, and I'm helping the desktop team manage their backlog and am marking this issue as stale.

Issue Summary:

* You reported that Surfing Keys extension's tab switching shortcuts (E for back, R for next) malfunction on Windows version 1.14.11b.

* Specifically, the back shortcut does not work, and the next shortcut skips a tab.

* This issue affects normal tabs but does not affect pinned tabs.

* There have been no further comments or updates on this issue.

Next Steps:

* Please let me know if this issue is still relevant with the latest version of the desktop app by commenting here.

* If I do not hear back within 10 days, I will automatically close this issue.

Thank you for your understanding and contribution!

@dosu
yes the issue is still relevant with the latest version of the version i am using, but there has been change on my side i am not anymore on windows i am on NixOs latest version 25.11 and the version of Zen browser i am using is

ZEN BROWSER Twilight
v1.17.7b • Firefox 145.0 | November 15, 2025

and the issue is still exactly the same as i mentioned.

[dosubot]

Hi @Mukulkalsait! I'm Dosu and I’m helping the desktop team.

Thanks for confirming the issue is still present on NixOS and the latest Zen Browser. This behavior is caused by how Zen Browser internally manages tabs: pinned and normal tabs are handled in separate containers with different logic for tab switching and navigation. For normal tabs, the tab switching logic filters out pinned tabs and sometimes other special tabs, which can cause extensions like Surfing Keys to see a different tab order than what’s visually shown. This leads to the shortcuts (E for back, R for next) not working as expected for normal tabs, while pinned tabs work fine because they’re managed separately and more predictably by the browser’s logic. There’s no direct integration or compatibility layer for Surfing Keys in Zen, so the issue comes from Zen’s custom tab management diverging from standard Firefox behavior, not from the extension itself.

There aren’t any official workarounds documented, but if you rely on keyboard tab switching, you might have better results using Zen’s built-in tab navigation shortcuts, which were recently improved to work across all tabs, even on protected pages (see PR #3599). If you need more customization or want to see this fixed for extensions, you could reference this technical detail in future feedback or discussions.

To reply, just mention @dosu.

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