Stardock launches Groupy to bring tabs to all of your apps

Microsoft may be working on its own tabbed app solution, but if you want to add tabs to any app on your PC now, Stardock's latest app, Groupy, is worth a look. While already available to Stardock's Object Desktop users in beta since November, Groupy is now available for everyone.

Groupy essentially lets you take the tabbed experience from your browser and apply it to any app on your PC. Not only can you use Groupy to consolidate different instances of the same app in one window, but you can bring other apps together in a single window as well.

Using Groupy looks to be pretty simple as well. It operates by simply dragging and dropping apps onto each other to create tabs within a window. This lets you group up programs for specific tasks you may be working on, or simply consolidate all of your open apps into a single window as you see fit. Managing the tabs works just as you've grown used to with a browser, with Groupy allowing you to switch between them with a click. Mouseover previews are also supported so you can preview the contents of a tab before clicking over.

We recently spent some time with Groupy and came away pretty impressed. Microsoft's upcoming Sets feature in Windows 10 may offer a similar set of features, but it's not available just yet.

If you're interested, Groupy is available now for $9.99 on its own (opens in new tab). Stardock's Object Desktop users will also be able to use Groupy as part of the suite, which is currently on sale for $29.99 (opens in new tab).

See at Stardock (opens in new tab)

Dan Thorp-Lancaster is the Editor in Chief for Windows Central. He began working with Windows Central as a news writer in 2014 and is obsessed with tech of all sorts. You can follow Dan on Twitter @DthorpL and Instagram @heyitsdtl. Got a hot tip? Send it to daniel.thorp-lancaster@futurenet.com.

10 Comments

Testing it right now.
Doesn't really feel polished in terms of design and usability. The grey top bar looks pretty ugly, when minimizing a maxed window and open it again via taskbar, it's getting resized. You have to max it out manually again.
I am looking into it, if there is a feature implemented that offers the ability to group certain apps/programs automatically when opening them, would be very useful.
There are some options for the bar. You can choose to have no bar, have it be transparent, or pick your own colors. What color would you prefer the tab bar to be? Also, we're trying to reproduce the min/max issue.
Why doesn't Microsoft just buy them?
Nice. But sorry not going to pay when this feature coming with next Windows 10 Update for free.
Does it allow to have multiple open instances of the same app, eg. Photoshop?
Yes, that's one of the great things about using Groupy.
I thought they died after XP. Because that was the last time I used anything from them. 😁
I'm trying the 30-day trial, agree grey title bar is ugly. Overall I really do like the concept and even with two monitors I can see it becoming handy. What I can't seem to figure out is how do you (can you) save a group and pin it to the start menu? If I can't save my Groupy collection, e.g., Outlook, ToDoist, Twitter as a group that can be saved and pinned... it's of no value.
You can choose to have no bar. What color would you prefer it to be?
I find it surprisingly useful on my relatively small S3 screen, it kind of replaces my use of the tablet mode, as l like desktop mode more. Groupy appears to prevent the cluttered impression one quickly gets when a few windows are open at the same time (like To Do, Excel and Outlook). It appears to give a more organized, comfortable and slightly different look that is easier to the eyes. I like to pay developers for good things, and this has been such a case as far as I am concerned. In the settings part of Groupy, under the colour tab, I enabled the last three options, so that the rubbon gives a pretty look.

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