Help

On this page:

What’s it for?

You might not think about it but you likely open a new browser tab many times a day. A Fine Start is for making that page more useful and nice than what browsers show by default. When you open a new tab with A Fine Start, you get a simple list of links, grouped and sorted how you like. Whether it is links to your email and calendar, or your guilty YouTube pleasures is up to you.

How it works

A Fine Start stores your bookmarks directly in your browser. When you have a Premium subscription, your bookmarks are also stored online so that you can access them on multiple devices and browsers.

Important note for the web version (does not apply to extensions): If you clear your browser’s cookies and personal data, you will lose the local copy of your bookmarks. Again, this only applies to the web version. If you have a Premium subscription, you can login and recover your bookmarks. But otherwise they will be gone. If you have a lot of bookmarks and you don’t have a subscription, consider backing up your bookmarks using the export tool.

Setting up your new tab page

In Chrome: Install the A Fine Start extension for Chrome

In Firefox: Install the A Fine Start add-on for Firefox

In Edge: Install the A Fine Start add-on for Edge

In Safari: Make https://afinestart.me/bookmarks your homepage in Safari → Preferences. Then set new tabs to open with the homepage.

A note about Arc

Arc browser doesn’t have a new tab page. Whenever you open a new tab in Arc, you get a command dialog where you can enter a search or a URL. As such, there isn’t a new tab page for A Fine Start to take over. That said, you can make use of the web hosted version of A Fine Start by going to https://afinestart.me/bookmarks and dragging it up to Arc’s pinned tab area. That will ensure that all of your A Fine Start bookmarks are a click away.

Quickly adding bookmarks

If you’re using one of the official extensions, you can click on the A Fine Start icon in the browser’s toolbar to quickly add the URL from the currently active tab to your A Fine Start bookmarks. This feature is available to both regular users and Premium subscribers.

Adding bookmarks manually. Both the extension and web version support adding bookmarks manually. Click Add in the action bar. You can add a bookmark to an existing group or a new one. To quickly enter multiple bookmarks back-to-back, check Stay on this page.

Grouping and sorting bookmarks

Once you have added at least one bookmark, you will see an Edit button in the action bar at the top of the page. Clicking it will activate edit mode. When edit mode is active you can drag and drop bookmarks or whole groups. You can click the pencil button an individual bookmark to edit it. You can also delete bookmarks by clicking the X button.

Group editing. While edit mode is active, you can click the pencil button next to any group to open the group edit dialog. There you can rename the group and optionally sort its bookmarks.

Adding and removing columns. While edit mode is active, you can add a column by clicking the New column button. When a column is empty, you may click the Remove column button to remove it. A Fine Start supports up to seven columns. By default, A Fine Start has three columns.

When you’re done, click Edit in the action bar again to deactivate edit mode.

Group folding. If you have a lot of groups, you might like to fold ones you don’t use often. Go to Settings and check the box next to Group folding. Once checked, you can click on group headers to fold and unfold them.

Bulk opening bookmarks

You can open multiple bookmarks at once by checking the Bulk open groups feature in Settings. Once enabled, clicking on a group name will open all of the bookmarks in that group into new tabs.

If group folding is also enabled then clicking a group name will collapse and reveal the group. To bulk open a group, hold Command (Control on Windows) when clicking the group name.

Searching your bookmarks

Press Shift+Command+K (Shift-Control+K on Windows) to activate the search pane. You can begin typing and results will appear below. Use up and down arrows to select a result and press enter to navigate. This works in both the extension and web versions.

Due to browser limitations, you still need to tab into the page to focus the search box before typing your search if you currently have the URL bar focused.

Note that this shortcut may not work if another app is already using it.

Changing the look and feel of the page

A Fine Start has several options for changing the appearance of your new tab page.

Themes. By default, A Fine Start will follow your system preference for light or dark themes. In Settings under the Appearance heading you can set your theme manually to Light, Dark or any of the other themes available.

Action bar options. In the appearance settings you will also find several options for changing the action bar, the toolbar that appears at the top of the page. You can set it to hide and show itself, have it use icons rather than words, and hide the get premium button if you don’t want to see it.

You can check the option to hide the footer on the bookmarks page if you find it distracting. . Finally you can set the page’s scrollbar to match the current theme rather than the browser’s default appearance.

Chrome extension users will see a button to open Chrome’s default new tab page. This button is here so that you can get to Chrome’s customization settings. See more information here.

Using A Fine Start as your homepage

In Chrome, go to Settings > Appearance. Select Show home button and select New Tab page.

In Firefox:

In Edge, go to Settings > Start, home, and new tabs. Activate the toggle under Home button and select New Tab page.

Restoring bookmarks from previous state

If you have made changes you no longer want, you can restore bookmarks from a previous point in time. Go to Settings > Restore points.

Restore points are saved in your browser and available for both regular users and Premium subscribers. Note that restore points are not saved in your online account. Because they’re local, restore points only represent the historical state of your bookmarks in a particular browser.

Here’s how it works. Every time you make a change to your bookmarks (e.g., adding one, editing one, reordering them) A Fine Start saves a restore point. When you go to Settings > Restore points you will see a bookmarks view along with the date and time. You can use the Older button to page through your restore points. When you are happy with what you see, click Restore these bookmarks. That will cause your current bookmarks to be replaced with those from the restore point (but don’t worry, your existing bookmarks are saved as a restore point so you can get them back if needed).

Once you have 100 restore points saved, A Fine Start will begin deleting the oldest restore points when needed to make room for new ones.

Importing and exporting your bookmarks

A Fine Start offers free import and export tools. These tools are for moving your bookmarks between A Fine Start in different browsers or devices. At this time it isn’t possible to import your browser’s bookmarks into A Fine Start or to export your A Fine Start bookmarks in the format required by your browser.

To export your bookmarks go to Settings and choose Export bookmarks from the Import/Export section. Copy the code shown and save it somewhere (if you want).

To import your bookmarks into A Fine Start on a different browser or device, go to Settings and choose Export bookmarks from the Import/Export section. Paste the export code into the text box and click Import Now. Note that this will completely replace your current bookmarks. If you decide you want to undo the import you can restore your bookmarks to a previous state.

If you have a premium subscription you probably don’t need these tools as your bookmarks are automatically synced between different browsers and devices.

Premium subscription

The core functionality of A Fine Start is free and doesn’t require an account. That said, if you use A Fine Start with multiple browsers or devices, consider subscribing to a Premium account. A Premium subscription is $5 per month (or $40 annually) and quietly works behind the scenes to keep all of your bookmarks (and groups, and ordering) in sync.

Managing your account

If you already have an account, you can update your payment information, switch between monthly and annual subscriptions, or cancel your subscription by visiting the account portal page.

Switching subscription types

A Fine Start offers an annual Premium subscription at 33% off the monthly subscription. You can switch your current subscription type in the account portal.

If you are currently on a monthly Premium sub you can upgrade to the annual Premium sub at a prorated price.

If you switch from the annual sub to the monthly sub, your annual sub remains active until the end of the billing period. Then the monthly sub will start up.

Cancelling your subscription

You are free to cancel your subscription at any time by visiting the account portal page. Your Premium account will remain active until the end of the billing period.

Contact

You may contact me, Blake Watson, by emailing me at blake@afinestart.me.

Frequently Asked Questions

How do I get my bookmarks on another computer?

You have two options if you want your bookmark collection on more than one web browser or device:

  1. If you click Settings, you will find a tool for exporting your bookmarks. The export tool will generate some code. Save this code wherever you like. Using A Fine Start on your other browser or device, go to Settings and use the import tool to load your bookmarks.
  2. If you have a Premium subscription, you can simply log in. Your browser will download the latest copy of your bookmarks from your account, and any additions or changes you make will appear on your other logged-in browsers.

My bookmarks are gone! What happened?

If you are using the free version, it means you may have cleared your browser’s website data, or your browser’s localStorage was deleted by some other means. In this case, there’s no way to recover your bookmarks. This only happens when using the web version. It is recommended that you use the official extensions for Chrome, Firefox, and Edge.

If you have a Premium subscription and something has happened to your bookmarks, email blake@afinestart.me. I may be able to recover your bookmarks from a backup.

I saw a browser message asking about persistent storage. What does that mean?

If you see this message, please allow it. This permission affects A Fine Start’s web version. It will let your browser know that A Fine Start is keeping important information for you that should not be cleared out by the browser.

Why doesn’t the free version save my bookmarks online?

Two reasons: cost and privacy.

A Fine Start gives all of its essential functionality away for free. Syncing your bookmarks is a nice and convenient—but not critical—feature. Because the syncing service is what costs the most to maintain, it’s included as part of the premium subscription.

The other reason is privacy. I like the idea that you can use A Fine Start without giving me your email address and that you don’t have to store your bookmarks in an online account if you don’t want to. That said, if you do decide that you want a Premium subscription, you can trust that I won’t abuse my access to your data. For more, see A Fine Start’s privacy policy.

How do I get to the Customize Chrome panel in Google Chrome?

Google Chrome’s built-in new tab page now has a “Customize Chrome” button that opens a side panel with various options for changing the color theme of Chrome. If you have A Fine Start installed as an extension, it replaces the built-in new tab page. But you can still navigate directly to Chrome’s built-in new tab page by visiting chrome://new-tab-page directly.

For security reasons it is impossible for me to link you there from this website, but if you open a new tab using A Fine Start and go to Settings, you will find a link there that can open the built-in new tab page and give you access to the customization panel.

Changelog

View the changelog here.