How to Use AI Without Switching Tabs

Tab Switching Is the Hidden Productivity Killer

Research from the University of California, Irvine found it takes an average of 23 minutes and 15 seconds to fully refocus after a context switch. Even if a tab switch only takes 10 seconds, the cognitive cost is much higher. Your brain has to re orient itself to the new context, execute the task, and then re orient again when you switch back.

If you're using ChatGPT in a browser tab, every single AI query costs you two context switches: one to ChatGPT, and one back. Do that 20 times a day and you've burned serious mental energy on nothing but switching windows.

The solution isn't to stop using AI. It's to bring the AI to where you already are.

1. Split Screen with ChatGPT

The simplest approach: put ChatGPT on one half of your screen and your work on the other. Both are visible at the same time, so you don't "switch" tabs in the traditional sense.

This works for light use, but the screen space trade off hurts. On a laptop, you end up with two cramped windows. And you still need to manually copy content from your work window into ChatGPT.

2. AI Browser Extension

Extensions like Sider, Monica, or Merlin add AI sidebars to your browser. You can highlight text on a webpage and ask the AI about it without opening a new tab.

Browser extensions are a step up from tab switching, but they're limited to one app: the browser. If you're working in VS Code, Figma, Word, a PDF viewer, or any native desktop app, the extension can't help you.

3. AI Spotlight/Launcher

Tools like Raycast AI or Alfred with AI plugins give you a Spotlight style input bar you can summon with a hotkey. Type a question, get an answer in a floating popup.

Launchers solve the "works everywhere" problem but still require you to manually describe what you're looking at. If you have a math equation, a chart, or an error message on screen, you have to type it out or describe it. That's slow and error prone.

4. App Specific AI (GitHub Copilot, Notion AI)

Some apps have AI built directly in. GitHub Copilot lives inside VS Code. Notion AI lives inside Notion. They understand the specific context of that one app.

Built in AI is great for the one app it works in. But most people use dozens of apps every day. You can't have Copilot in your email client, in your PDF viewer, and in Slack. The AI is siloed.

5. AI Overlay (the Screen Level Approach)

An AI overlay sits on top of your entire screen. You press a hotkey from any app, drag a box around whatever you want the AI to look at, and get an answer in a floating popup. The AI reads the pixels on your screen directly.

This is the approach LowLighter takes. One hotkey, one drag, one answer. It works in every app on your computer because it operates at the screen level, above any individual app.

The key advantage over every other method: you don't have to describe what you're looking at. The AI sees it. Math equations, error messages, foreign text, handwritten notes, diagrams. Just drag over it and the vision model reads it directly.

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