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Comment by pjmlp | Hacker News Reader

You actually couldn't, because browsers did not support tabs back then.

200 browsers instances more likely.

Opera and Firefox, "actually" (along with some lesser-known browsers), introduced tabs around the same time as, or very soon after, the launch of Windows 2000.

Alternatively, read "tabs" as "windows" - we know the word "tabs" is not the important point of that post (and that the number 200 is exaggerating for effect). Right clicking a link and selecting "open in new window" opened a new window in the same browser instance, not a separate instance, although there wouldn't be any visual difference.

Windows XP and Windows Server 2003 were the current versions at the time.

I'm pretty sure my Pentium 3 PC back in the day had 128 or 256MB memory, and I ran tabbed Mozilla/Seamonkey as well as the first versions of Firefox ("Phoenix"), both with tabs. 2003ish.

Cold Phoenix start on Windows XP was similar to Firefox startup today on a Mac :D (ok, maybe a few seconds longer of pegging the CPU)

Windows XP was the follow up to Windows 2000.

Yeah, and it took up to 2006 for IE to support tabs.

Anyway, by then Windows 2000 already had its replacements on Windows XP, and Windows Server 2003.

Mozilla introduced tabs in 2001 and ran on Windows NT and 2000: https://www-archive.mozilla.org/releases/mozilla0.9.5/

Opera definitely had them around that time

https://pspb.chrisrcook.com/2025/09/20/4_windows-xp-home-x86...

On Windows XP.

Opera supported win 2000 until 2010s. Same for Firefox which had tabs in its version 1.0 in 2004.