You’ve got at least 47 tabs open across 4 different Chrome windows at all times. Me too.
Maybe your phone rings and you want to pause that music you’re listening to. Or someone walks into the room.
Or maybe you reboot your computer and suddenly hear a distant soundtrack. Voices. WHICH TAB IS AUTO-PLAYING A VIDEO?!
Who has time to click through all 47 of the open tabs to find the culprit and press pause or mute?
You mute your computer sound instead… for now, but that hasn’t solved the problem.
I’m here to tell you, that yes, there’s a better way – a way to pause any video(s) playing, even if you’re not on the tab in question.
The solution is hiding in the far upper right of your Chrome browser – the audio and video controls (which, incidentally, you won’t see unless there’s something playing or paused):
Give it a try! Open a YouTube video and hit play, and you’ll see that beautiful control button show up.
Once you click that little sucker button, you’ll see all the items that are (or were) playing any audio (videos, or audio only), including paused videos.
In the example below, I started playing a song on Spotify, and two YouTube videos, and then paused one of the two videos. Two audio tracks playing out loud on two different tabs, and yet one click of that magical audio control button and another click to pause what’s playing, and I am once again the master of my ears.
Hope this quick tip made your day! When I first found it, it sure made mine.
