Polystream install guide

How it works

Course portals and streaming sites enforce one active tab through visibility signals, heartbeats, locks, and server kick messages. Polystream intercepts all of these client-side so every tab believes it is the active one.

It ships as a Manifest V3 extension for Firefox and Chrome, plus a one-file userscript for script managers and mobile browsers.

Install the userscript

Install Violentmonkey or Tampermonkey in your browser. Kiwi and Orion bring the same support to mobile.

Create a new script in the manager dashboard, paste the full contents of multi-tab-enabler.user.js from the repo, and save. No build step and no permissions dialog beyond the manager itself.

Note: This bypasses restrictions that platforms put in deliberately. Check your course or streaming service terms and only use it with content you are entitled to watch.

Install the extension

Clone the repo, open the extensions page (chrome://extensions or edge://extensions), enable Developer mode, and load the project folder unpacked.

The extension updates when you pull the repo, which suits desktops where you already live in a Chromium browser.

git clone https://github.com/pdev-labs/polystream.git

Verify

Open the same portal in two tabs and start both videos. Both keep playing when you switch tabs, with no lockout dialog.

Spacebar and click controls still work normally. Only programmatic background pauses are blocked.

Limits

DRM-protected services enforce concurrency on their servers, not in your browser. No client-side tool can unlock those, and this one does not try.

Portals change their player code regularly. When a lockout dialog survives, pull the latest repo version before reporting it, the selectors usually just moved.

Troubleshooting

Userscript does nothing: confirm the manager shows it enabled for the site, then hard-refresh. A stale cached player from before install is the usual cause.

Extension loads but tabs still pause: open the extensions page and press reload on the entry, then reopen the tabs. Developer-mode unpacked extensions do not auto-reload their content scripts.