Can I create a new session in another tab or window in Google Chrome?

Question

I have multiple accounts on many of the same services. I would like a better way to manage my sessions.

• A personal Gmail account, and one for work
• A personal Amazon account, one for work
• A personal hosting account, one for work, one I manage for a freelance client
• Many other scenarios like this

As a developer, I'd like to avoid repetitive logins for

• browse as a logged-in admin
• browse as a logged-in user
• browse as a guest, or any other role

I'd like to avoid having to logout, login, logout, login, over and over again.

I understand that some services like Gmail offer simultaneous logins, but I want a general purpose solution that works for all services.

Chrome Incognito Mode is not designed for this

• Chrome Incognito Mode gives you a new cookie jar, but cookies are shared across other incognito windows. At best, this means you can have two sessions.

• Other browser extensions you may rely upon are not available in Incognito windows (nor should they be)

• This isn't Incognito's intended purpose

Solution 1

Currently, this is not possible.

You can use multiple profiles in Google Chrome, though. Read the instructions here.

Solution 2

1. Enable multiple accounts: https://www.google.com/accounts/MultipleSessions
2. Then, create a bookmark(let) or a keyboard shortcut for each mailbox:

https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/#inbox

https://mail.google.com/mail/u/1/#inbox

Source: http://lifehacker.com/5733636/switch-between-multiple-gmail-accounts-with-a-url-hack

Solution 3

MultiLogin is down from the google webstore, but there is an alternative (SessionBox) https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/sessionbox-beta/megbklhjamjbcafknkgmokldgolkdfig

Solution 4

Ghost Browser (http://ghostbrowser.com) allows you to do all of those things from one browser window. Every time you open a new tab you can assign it to an isolated cookie jar so whether you are logging in to multiple google accounts or are testing different account levels of a web site you are building, you can do it all in one browser window. It's built off of Chromium so you can also use your favorite Chrome extensions with it.

Disclaimer: I'm the founder of the company that built it.

Solution 5

So after being frustrated that such a simple plugin didn't exist, I made a script for launching a clean Chrome. It is called New Chrome Session.

https://bitbucket.org/bradisbell/new-chrome-session/overview

This creates a shortcut that launches a completely blank session, which tracks its own cookies and what not.

You can use this to login to multiple accounts simultaneously. It works great for Gmail and Facebook, as well as sites using basic auth. It should work for everything.

The only catch that I can see is that you can't use both within the same window. I don't think there is a way around this.

Anyway... enjoy!

View more solutions

Comments

[Honk]

I recently had a similar issue, Now that you can login to GoogleAPP accounts from gmail.com. I could have a Personal gmail and a work Gapp Account logged in with shortcut bar icon for each. I have yet to find a fix

[Metafaniel]

@Andrey answer about the extension MultiLogin is the best answer for me it works flawlessly

[Metafaniel]

About the question, it is also usefull this functionality for developers, foe example I'm programming a web system with multiple users profiles and with that plugin I can log in as a distinct user in each tab and see test the interaction with all these roles ;)

[Brad]

Hey man, this is PERFECT!! Two completely separate sessions working great!!

[Christian]

Also, multiple profiles are something that are going to be baked into Chrome in the future. You can enable it in the Canary build or by navigating to about:flags in any version.

[Trindaz]

Link in answer appears broken. Find same info here: support.google.com/chrome/answer/2364824?hl=en

[Andrey]

@Jesse Jackson This answer is no longer true. Could you update your answer to reflect the fact that plugins now exist. I think this question is commonly found by Google

[Envite]

This solution is valid only for Google accounts.

[Mathieu Marques]

@DanielHári You don't have to. The extension doesn't work anyway.

[Daniel Hári]

SessionBox is very cumbersome and hard and annoying to use for this very simple use case of opening a new tab without the other tabs' sessions.

[Nabi K.A.Z.]

some time doesn't work!!!

[famzah]

Simple and effective!