How do I make one start page with all my work tools?

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A bookmarks bar is fine for five or six links. Past that it turns into a row of tiny, barely distinguishable icons you have to hover over one at a time to confirm which is which, which somewhat defeats the point of a shortcut. The new tab page itself, meanwhile, usually sits unused, showing a search box and maybe a few of the browser's own suggested sites, nothing you actually asked for.

What WebCatalog New Tab actually does

Confirmed directly on WebCatalog's own New Tab page: it replaces that default new tab page with a custom home built around your own apps and bookmarks. You can choose a wallpaper, arrange the layout, add widgets, and organize everything into folders and separate pages for different contexts, a work page, a personal page, a page per active project, rather than one undifferentiated pile of icons.

• App catalog access. Add favorites from WebCatalog's existing catalog, or turn any website into a custom app tile directly from the new tab page.
• Widgets. Weather, a currency converter, a to-do list and a focus timer are built in, so the page can double as a lightweight dashboard, not just a launcher.
• Folders and pages. Group tools by context and flip between pages, so your work tools and personal links don't have to live in the same visual clutter.
• Cross-device and cross-browser sync. Your layout follows you between Chrome, Edge, Firefox, Brave and Vivaldi, plus a web version at atlas.webcatalog.io if you want to check your setup without the extension installed.

One thing worth flagging plainly: WebCatalog's own New Tab page doesn't state a price anywhere, which the source material for this article also noted. There's no visible paid tier or upgrade prompt on the page itself, so treat it as free to install and use unless you encounter something that says otherwise once you're actually using it.

Step by step: how to set up your start page

1. Install the WebCatalog New Tab extension for your browser (Chrome, Edge, Firefox, Brave or Vivaldi) from WebCatalog's site.
2. Pick a wallpaper and general layout before adding apps, since this is easier to settle on first than to redo later around a page full of tiles.
3. Add your actual daily tools, either from WebCatalog's catalog or by turning a specific website straight into a tile. Resist the urge to add everything you occasionally use; the whole point is cutting down to what you reach for constantly.
4. Group tools into folders or separate pages by context: a work page, a client-specific page, a personal page. This is what actually prevents the new sprawl problem the bookmarks bar had. The wider habit is covered in keeping client work and your own tasks apart on one computer.
5. Turn on the widgets you'll actually use. A to-do list only helps if you check it; a focus timer only helps if you use focus sessions. Skip the ones that would just be visual noise.
6. Install the same extension on your other browsers or devices and confirm your layout syncs across, rather than assuming it transferred without checking. A new machine is covered in moving your web apps and setup to a new computer.

A realistic example: cleaning up a 20-link bookmarks bar

Imagine your current bookmarks bar has grown to around 20 links: five client project boards, your CRM, invoicing, two internal docs, a handful of reference sites, and a few personal bookmarks that snuck in. Finding the right one means reading tiny favicons left to right, and new tabs show nothing useful at all.

Rebuilt as a WebCatalog New Tab setup, that same list becomes two or three pages: a client page with the five project boards as clearly labeled tiles, a work page with the CRM, invoicing and internal docs, and a personal page kept separate so it's not competing for space with work tools. The weather widget and to-do list sit on the work page since that's where you'd actually glance at them during the day. Opening a new tab now shows exactly what you need for whatever context you're in, instead of either a blank page or a cluttered row of unlabeled icons.

New Tab vs. just organizing your bookmarks folders better

It's fair to ask whether this is solving a problem a tidier bookmarks folder structure could fix for free, without installing anything. For a genuinely small number of links, it probably can; nested folders in a bookmarks bar are a real, no-cost option. Where New Tab pulls ahead is visual recognition (a labeled tile with an icon is faster to spot than a folder you have to click open) and the fact that it's the very first thing you see on every new tab, not something you navigate to. If you're the kind of person who opens 20 tabs a day, that first-glance speed adds up in a way a folder you have to open deliberately doesn't.

Common mistakes when setting this up

• Adding everything you've ever used, not just what you use daily. A start page with 40 tiles across six pages is barely better than the bookmarks bar it replaced. Be ruthless about what actually earns a spot on the front page versus a secondary one you check less often.
• Skipping the folder/page structure and dumping everything onto one screen. The real value of New Tab over bookmarks is context separation, not just prettier icons. If you don't use folders or pages, you've mostly just moved the clutter rather than fixed it.
• Forgetting to install it on every browser you actually use. If you switch between, say, Chrome for work and Firefox for personal browsing, install the extension on both and confirm sync, rather than rebuilding your setup from memory on the second one. If work links open in the wrong profile, see stopping work links opening in your personal Chrome profile.
• Turning on every widget by default. A focus timer you never start and a to-do list you never check are just extra visual noise competing with the apps you actually came for.

New Tab alongside the rest of WebCatalog

New Tab is one piece of a wider set of WebCatalog products that overlap in purpose but solve slightly different versions of the same problem. The main WebCatalog desktop app turns a website into its own standalone app window with a dock icon, which matters if you want a tool to feel separate from your browser entirely, not just easier to find inside it. New Tab, by contrast, keeps everything inside the browser but makes the browser itself the launcher. Many people end up using both: desktop apps for the handful of tools they want running as their own window all day, and New Tab as the home base for everything else they open occasionally through the browser. They're not competing choices so much as two layers of the same underlying idea, pick whichever fits a specific tool's role in your day.

When to skip this

If your actual daily tool list is small enough that a simple bookmarks bar already works without friction, adding another extension and another layer to configure is probably more setup than the problem deserves. This is squarely for people whose current tab or bookmark situation has already become a small daily annoyance, not a preventive step for someone with four tidy bookmarks.

How I'd approach this

For an individual or a small team, WebCatalog New Tab is a low-effort, no-cost fix for exactly the kind of daily friction a messy bookmarks bar creates, and I'd just try it rather than overthink it. Where this stops being enough is a business that wants a genuinely shared, centrally managed start page for an entire team, consistent for everyone, updated once and reflected everywhere, which is closer to an internal company portal than a personal browser extension. If that's the actual need, it's worth talking through what a small custom internal tool would look like instead of stretching a personal productivity extension to do a team-wide job it wasn't built for. For new staff specifically, see getting every new hire into the same tools in one click.