1. The browsers Tabularia runs in
Tabularia needs a current browser. These are the oldest versions it opens in:
- Chrome 125 or later.
- Edge 125 or later.
- Firefox 140 or later.
- Safari 18 or later.
On an iPhone or iPad the browser's own number is not the one that counts. Every browser there is built on Safari's engine, so Tabularia reads the system's version instead and asks for iOS 18 or iPadOS 18, whichever browser you use.
Brave, Opera, and Vivaldi are built on Chrome's engine; they report Chrome's version and are held to Chrome's number. They open Tabularia. Not all of them switch on every extra the table below credits to Chrome and Edge, though, so if one is missing, try the same address in Chrome.
Below the minimum, Tabularia does not open. In its place is a card headed Your browser needs an upgrade. It names the version you need and asks you to update the browser, or the device on an iPhone or iPad, and then reload. A browser that is new enough by number but lacks a feature the editor depends on gets the same card. Only Tabularia is held back; this guide and the rest of the site still open. Tabularia needs JavaScript as well, and with it switched off the page says so rather than loading the editor.
2. Computers, tablets, and phones
Tabularia is one web app on every system, so whatever runs one of those browsers opens the same projects:
- macOS — Chrome, Edge, Firefox, or Safari.
- Windows — Chrome, Edge, or Firefox.
- Linux — Chrome, Edge, or Firefox.
- ChromeOS — Chrome, the browser a Chromebook comes with.
- iPadOS and iOS — any browser, on version 18 or later.
- Android — Chrome, Edge, or Firefox, on a phone or a tablet.
On a smaller screen Tabularia rearranges itself. Writing on a phone or tablet explains which shape you get and what a phone leaves out.
3. Chrome or Edge on a computer does the most
Every browser above writes, saves, and keeps working offline. For the machine you do most of your writing on, though, the recommendation is Google Chrome on a computer — or Microsoft Edge, which is built on the same engine and behaves the same way in Tabularia. A handful of features rest on things only those two can do on a desktop. Elsewhere Tabularia leaves them out rather than offering something that would not work.
| Chrome or Edge on a computer | Safari on a Mac | Firefox on a computer | iPhone or iPad | Android | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Install as an app | Yes, from the browser menu | Yes: File, then Add to Dock | On Windows only, from Firefox 143 | Yes: Add to Home Screen | Yes, from the browser menu |
| Backup folder on your disk | Yes, in a tab or installed | No | No | No | No |
| Open With for manuscript files | Yes, once installed | No | No | No | No |
| Persistent storage | Asked for on its own | Asked for on its own | Asked when you press the button | Asked for on its own | On its own, except in Firefox |
| Works offline | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes | Yes |
The backup folder is the difference worth choosing a browser for. It keeps a copy of every project in a folder on your own disk, where clearing the browser cannot reach it; Keeping backups in a folder covers choosing one and restoring from it. Phones and tablets are left out even in Chrome, because a folder inside a handheld's own storage is not a second copy anywhere.
The other extra needs the installed app. Open With puts Tabularia in the list Finder or File Explorer offers for a manuscript file, and opening one from there imports it as a new project; Importing an existing manuscript names the file types. Installing it as an app describes that window and each browser's way to install.
With persistent storage granted, a browser keeps your projects when the disk runs short and leaves clearing them to you. Tabularia asks for it quietly wherever the browser answers without interrupting you. Firefox asks you in a prompt of its own, so there Tabularia waits until you press Request persistent storage in Storage & Usage; On your device has the rest.
4. On a Chromebook
A Chromebook counts as a computer. Chrome on ChromeOS is the desktop Chrome, and Tabularia treats it as one. It installs from the browser menu and offers the backup folder. Once installed, it also turns up under Open With in the Files app.
A touchscreen does not make it a tablet. Tabularia picks its layout from the width of the window, as it does on any computer, and folding the Chromebook into tablet mode leaves the backup folder and Open With where they were. Held upright, a narrow screen can get the tablet layout — the same one a narrow desktop window gets.
5. Hardware
Tabularia sets no hardware minimum of its own: if the browser opens Tabularia, it runs. What the machine changes is how it feels, and the manuscript decides most of that. The figures below are rules of thumb, not measured thresholds.
Memory
For a novel, 8 GB of memory on a computer is comfortable. Choose 16 GB for a very long manuscript, a Series of several Books, or a book full of pictures. Tabularia holds the open manuscript in memory and keeps the pages around your place laid out and ready, so a longer book asks for more. On a smaller machine, closing other heavy tabs does more than any setting.
Processor
A processor from the last several years is enough for ordinary writing. Tabularia lays out pages and saves your work on background threads, apart from the one that answers your keystrokes, so more cores keep typing responsive while a long manuscript finishes opening. At a million words that opening work runs to seconds. The timings on the home page were measured on an Apple Silicon laptop, and an older machine takes longer over the same book.
Disk space
Words take very little room. Pictures take nearly all of it, and they count against your plan's allowance — 250 MB on Free and 5 GB with Cloud — which makes that figure a fair measure of what your images can fill in the browser. Leave room for more than one copy. The browser keeps its own, a backup folder keeps another, and every export or project archive you file away adds one more.
Browsers also cap how much of the disk one site may use, and a nearly full disk leaves them less to give. Keep some of it free; On your device says what Tabularia tells you when the browser's space runs low.
6. Continue reading
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