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I love pretty much everything about how Gnome Shell handles app-switching through Alt+Tab. My one gripe with it, though, is how it forces the user to use Alt+` (or Alt+ whatever key above the Tab key for non-US keyboard layouts) to switch between windows of the same app. This is very annoying for me, because now I have to keep in mind if the last window I was using belonged to the same app as the current window or not. Definitely a nuisance for power users who thinks in terms of "windows I'm working with" instead of "applications I'm working on".

I've tried the AlternateTab extension, but it's looks way too ugly for me. Not to mention that in the end all I want is to remap Alt+(key above tab) to Alt+Tab on this application. I guess one option would be to just tweak Gnome-shell. My guess is that I should tinker with the altTab.js file at /usr/share/gnome-shell/js/ui/, but the file is too long and overwhelming for someone like me, who doesn't know JavaScript.

Does anyone know how I can make Gnome Shell stop grouping windows by applications?

Waldir Leoncio
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19 Answers19

423
  • Open dconf-editor
  • Go to org/gnome/desktop/wm/keybindings
  • Move the value '<Alt>Tab' from switch-applications to switch-windows
  • Optionally move '<Shift><Alt>Tab' from switch-applications-backward to switch-windows-backward
  • If you want switch-windows to work across desktops, not just in the current desktop, you can also uncheck org/gnome/shell/window-switcher/current-workspace-only (Courtesy of @CharlBotha)
  • Close dconf-editor
  • If using X11, press <Alt>F2, then type r to restart Gnome.

The last step does not always appear to be necessary, but it should not hurt (especially since it does not close any of your running applications). It will not work, and is not necessary for Wayland.

Mad Physicist
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294

For anyone who is using Ubuntu 18 (to give you the same behavior as e.g. on Windows10):

  • go to settings > devices > keyboard
  • look for the keyboard shortcut for "Switch windows"
  • set this to the shortcut Alt+Tab (this will overwrite the old shortcut)

If you now press Alt+Tab you will be able to directly select all open windows without grouping into the different apps.

Update: In Ubuntu 22.04.02 LTS, this is already the default behaviour.

Laurin Herbsthofer
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145

From the comment by 'xaeth' on this Ergo Project blog post, I have learned that Alt+Esc will cycle through all windows without grouping by application. This was the simplest solution for me, and I'm glad it saved me from having to install other programs.

If testing with Alt+Esc turns out favorably for you, then you can go to System Settings > Keyboard > Shortcuts > Navigation and reassign Alt+Tab to perform the navigation task that was previously assigned to Alt+Esc. In my settings this task is named 'Switch windows directly'.

pestophagous
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58

Little help -

Alt+Tab and then when you have grouped windows Alt+` helps a bit.

Raystafarian
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rtdp
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26

AlternateTab

Substitute Alt-Tab with a window based switcher that does not group by application. This extension is part of Classic Mode and is officially supported by GNOME. Please do not report bugs using the form below, use GNOME Bugzilla instead.

https://extensions.gnome.org/extension/15/alternatetab/

Community
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GorillaMoe
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18

The Windows Alt Tab extension by tglman is very useful. You can also fork it on GitHub.

evan.bovie
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Takida
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16

Don't know if it works like this for all OSes, but for Ubuntu 18.04 go to: Settings → Devices → Key

Then look for Switch windows which in my case is disabled and set it to Alt + Tab.

This switches between all windows and displays the horizontal selection box if we hold the Alt key down after tabbing.

There are other interesting entries there, namely Switch applications and Switch windows of an application which I have set for Super+Tab and Alt+Super+Tab respectively.

Daniel
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15

You can use the terminal to edit the preferences for the default switcher (This is a command-line equivalent of Mad Physicist's dconf-editor answer.)

run:

dconf write /org/gnome/desktop/wm/keybindings/switch-windows "['<Alt>Tab']"
dconf write /org/gnome/desktop/wm/keybindings/switch-windows-backward "['<Shift><Alt>Tab', '<Alt>Above_Tab']"
dconf write /org/gnome/desktop/wm/keybindings/switch-applications "[]"
dconf write /org/gnome/desktop/wm/keybindings/switch-applications-backward "[]"

or:

gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.wm.keybindings switch-windows "['<alt>Tab']"
etc...

(As a regular user - not root!!!)

Jonathan Hartley
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Yogev Neumann
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13

Using fedora 23 you can do the following

Install alternate-tab (was already installed for me)

sudo dnf install gnome-shell-extension-alternate-tab

Run pref editor

gnome-shell-extension-prefs

Then enable it

enter image description here

DONE, alt tab is no longer lame. Also its not some hack like the above with changing the keyboard short cuts. Alt-tab will still show the popup with thumbnails etc, just not grouped.

EDIT:

As Ubuntu has now switched back to Gnome I found myself trying to fix this issue again. It's even simpler if you have the gnome web plugin, just visit the alternate-tab plugin and click enable and it will be instantly fixed.

alternate tab

alternate tab

dogmatic69
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13

Script for executing on the command line (based on Mad Physicist's awesome answer):

gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.wm.keybindings switch-applications "['<Super>Tab']"
gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.wm.keybindings switch-windows "['<Alt>Tab']"
gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.wm.keybindings switch-applications-backward "['<Shift><Super>Tab']"
gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.wm.keybindings switch-windows-backward "['<Shift><Alt>Tab']"
gsettings set org.gnome.shell.window-switcher current-workspace-only "false"
Duco
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2
gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.wm.keybindings switch-windows "['<Alt>Tab']"
gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.wm.keybindings switch-windows-backward "['<Shift><Alt>Tab']"
gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.wm.keybindings switch-applications "[]"
gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.wm.keybindings switch-applications-backward "[]"
Lacoudasse
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1

You don't need to download anything, nor even use a gui if you do:

gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.wm.keybindings switch-applications "['<Super>Tab']"
gsettings set org.gnome.desktop.wm.keybindings switch-windows "['<Alt>Tab']"

Obviously, you can leave the keybinding for switch-applications blank ("[]") if you never want to use it.

This works on Ubuntu 18.04.

borizzzzz
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1

It's just a matter of readjusting the gnome default shortcuts.

# run as regular user
dconf load / <<EOF
[org/gnome/desktop/wm/keybindings]
switch-applications=['<Super>Tab']
switch-applications-backward=['<Shift><Super>Tab']
switch-windows=['<Alt>Tab']
switch-windows-backward=['<Shift><Alt>Tab']
EOF

This will use Alt-Tab to change to the next window while still keeping Super-Tab iterate through applications.

Javier
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1

The following works on CentOS Linux release 7.9.2009

Settings --> Devices --> Keyboard --> Navigation --> Switch windows

Screenshot for clarity

MMM
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AP22
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1

This post has shed some light on the subject. By accessing apps -> metacity -> global_keybindings on gconf-editor there's a key called switch_group, which is mapped to <Alt>Above_Tab. Changing that to <Alt>Tab should solve the issue.

Waldir Leoncio
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1

You can use the a different application switcher - can enabled using compizconfig-settings-manager.

See good info on CompizConfig in Ubuntu. It can also be installed on openSUSE and probably other distributions.

Result example: enter image description here

Community
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AlikElzin-kilaka
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0

The way I was able to do it was install the dconf editor from the Ubuntu Software Store. From there, you can follow the path -> /org.gnome/desktop/wm/keybindings. Path View

If you scroll down, you will see switch-applications which I change to ['Tab'] and right below it is switch-application-backwards which is now ['Tab'].

Switch Applications

Scrolling down, you will see switch-windows and switch-windows-backwards. You can set this to ['Tab'] and ['Tab'] respectively.

Switch Windows Settings

Just figured Id share. New to Ubuntu and this took me about an hour of googling to figure out. This definitely works.

Sam Spencer
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0

In Gnome Shell on Gnome 3.34.3 in Ubuntu 19.10 x86_64, Settings, Devices, Keyboard Shortcuts, Navigation, Switch windows "Alt+Tab" doesn't group, but also doesn't include minimized windows like the Coverflow Alt-Tab extension does, which also overrides the normal grouped Switch applications "Super+Tab" for no reason.

Cees Timmerman
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0

The "Tile Groups" setting may also cause Alt+Tab to prefer grouped windows over recent ones

In Ubuntu 23 (and likely some older ones), there's a "Tile Groups" setting that may group windows based on their position when tiling. So, when one window in a group is switched to, other windows in the group will also be brought to the top of the recent windows list. And so, when trying to Alt+Tab, it will cycle through through other windows in the group before your actual previously recent windows.

Turn off the 'Tile Groups' to have Alt+Tab cycle through only actually-recently used windows.

MotohawkSF
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