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I can press Cmd-L to get to the address bar, but I can't find a keystroke to bring me back to the page. It sounds like Esc works on Windows, but it doesn't work on the Mac. Is there an equivalent?

Peeja
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3 Answers3

28

How about this method using the browser's search:

  1. Ctrl + F (search)
  2. Input any single character into -- might as well search for an F on the page since your finger is already there
  3. Hit Enter taking you to the first search result
  4. Esc to cancel the search

It's a bit of a kludge, but it's fewer keystrokes than the tab solution proposed. With the tab solution, I have to tab over each of the Chrome extension icons and each item in my bookmarks bar before I get to the main window.

Jesse Reza Khorasanee
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Doug Harris
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    good idea, but requires - to me - too much cognitive load for that simple task. – Martin Sep 15 '16 at 07:33
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    I like this the most so far because it requires no extra configuration. There is another solution in the accepted answer's link which requires setting up custom javascript search engine entries. The Ctrl-F solution will work regardless of what computer or VM I am on. – Shadoninja Sep 29 '16 at 19:58
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    This solution moves the current scroll position of the browser view to the first match of the single character. – Rhys van der Waerden Feb 15 '17 at 20:58
  • Also wanted to not that this method also requires that the web page has an 'f' in it. Or at least some text so we can search a different letter. – Jesse Reza Khorasanee Aug 13 '19 at 03:33
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    on Mac it's enough just to press Cmd+F (search) and Esc to return focus on page. Thanks for idea – Sneg Dec 09 '19 at 19:48
  • For me, the focus is just going back to the address bar after pressing Esc. (Mac os Monterey) – Y. Gherbi Jan 06 '22 at 21:58
  • Thank you for making my day. Apple and Google should work together and make our life simpler. – Yarish Kumar Sep 04 '22 at 09:48
12

This question is also asked separately, and another highly upvoted answer is given here: https://superuser.com/a/324267/54335 which relies on creating a new search engine with a short keyword.

Community
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ezrock
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4

As per @Peeja's request, making my comment an answer:

How about 2x Tab?

Of course, it only works without any bars between location and web page. So hide the bookmark bar using Cmd-Shift-B temporarily.

Another option is (ab)using the Find related shortcuts to be able to move the page. If you're focusing the location bar, and press Cmd-F/G, any up/down key presses are forwarded to the web page view, as long as the find widget is open.

Unfortunately, neither the Chrome scripting dictionary nor the Chrome help were particularly useful.

You can (in theory) execute JavaScript via 

tell application "Google Chrome"
    tell window 1
        tell tab 1
            execute javascript "window.document.focus();"
        end tell
    end tell
end tell

But it doesn't work as expected.

You can use Typinator or a similar tool and create a hotkey that enters javascript:enter. This will "leave" the location bar by entering an empty javascript command.

Daniel Beck
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    My final solution: Shift-Tab four times. That tabs backwards past the four navigation buttons to the left of the address bar and back to the page. I bound this to a keyboard shortcut with Butler. (Typinator would work too.) Unfortunately, there's no way to make it only work in the right context: if I press it when the address bar isn't focused all sorts of things could happen. But it'll do. Thanks for the ideas and the thorough research! – Peeja Nov 28 '10 at 23:20
  • That doesn't work if you have extensions. Tab tabs through those first. – Bjorn Dec 01 '10 at 03:36
  • @Peeja definitely not a solution if you have a bookmark bar with a lot of bookmarks. It will focus each one before focusing the document! – Martin Sep 15 '16 at 07:31
  • My Chrome doesn't. The bookmarks all come after the address bar in the tab order, not before. – Peeja Sep 15 '16 at 19:48