# A way to prevent links from opening in a new window?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-way-to-prevent-links-from-opening-in-a-new-window/323672>\
**Category:** About This Message Board\
**Created:** [September 27, 2005, 2:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-way-to-prevent-links-from-opening-in-a-new-window/323672 "2005-09-27T14:56:38Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![bouv](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/bc8723/32.png) [@bouv](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bouv)\
**Post date:** [September 27, 2005, 2:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-way-to-prevent-links-from-opening-in-a-new-window/323672/1 "2005-09-27T14:56:38Z")

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OK, when not at work, i use Firefox. One thing I love is tabbed browsing. I can have several pages open in one window and just tne one little spot on the taskbar is used. But links on the boards open in a new window. Even though I have my Firefox settings to open all links in a new tab, it seems that the boards preference to open in a new window overrides that. I know I can right click and select to open in tab from the menu, but that takes away the point of enabeling the option to oipen all links in tabs. I want to be able to do it mindlessly.

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**Author:** ![TellMeI\_mNotCrazy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tellmei_mnotcrazy/32/3419_2.png) [@TellMeI\_mNotCrazy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TellMeI_mNotCrazy)\
**Post date:** [September 27, 2005, 3:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-way-to-prevent-links-from-opening-in-a-new-window/323672/2 "2005-09-27T15:01:57Z")

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You have both settings (Load links and Load external links) set to “New Tab”? I’ve never had a link that I encounter here open in a new window…

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**Author:** ![hawthorne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/c89c15/32.png) [@hawthorne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hawthorne)\
**Post date:** [September 27, 2005, 3:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-way-to-prevent-links-from-opening-in-a-new-window/323672/3 "2005-09-27T15:18:28Z")

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I click my mouse wheel in Firefox.

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**Author:** ![aldiboronti](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/9fc348/32.png) [@aldiboronti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aldiboronti)\
**Post date:** [September 27, 2005, 3:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-way-to-prevent-links-from-opening-in-a-new-window/323672/4 "2005-09-27T15:33:45Z")

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I recommend the [Tab Mix Plus](http://tabmix-en.blogspot.com/) extension for Firefox. It gives you absolute control over the opening of windows and tabs, far more than the vanilla Firefox options.

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**Author:** ![DarrenS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/977dab/32.png) [@DarrenS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DarrenS)\
**Post date:** [September 27, 2005, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-way-to-prevent-links-from-opening-in-a-new-window/323672/5 "2005-09-27T20:59:23Z")

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> [@hawthorne](#):
>
> I click my mouse wheel in Firefox.

…and if you don’t have a mousewheel, CTRL-click works too.