Google quietly added the experimental Offscreen Tabs Module to its most recent Chromium releases, which will enable users to show and interact with multiple web pages at the same time. Thanks to WebGL support, Google hopes that we could be seeing 3D browsing environments in the near future.

Google first described Offscreen Tabs via a Chromium Projects page in December of last year and recently updated the developer page with an intriguing video. Offscreen Tabs, which is basically and approach to show multiple web pages on a single screen, could become a useful tool for users with especially large screens, which would allow the display of more than just one web page and enable its user to work with all pages simultaneously.

Google equipped the Offscreen Tabs API with texture API and WebGL support, which permits the display of web pages in graphically complex scenarios. Google showcases an animated book built from live web pages and mentions Apple’s Top Sites feature as example. Chromium 16 received OffscreenTabs support in build 101678, which was released late Saturday. At this time, it does not appear that Offscreen Tabs are functional yet and there is no switch or flag to activate them.

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