This is a trick,

function openInNewTab(url) {
  window.open(url, '_blank').focus();
}

// Or just
window.open(url, '_blank').focus();

In most cases, this should happen directly in the onclick handler for the link to prevent pop-up blockers, and the default "new window" behavior. You could do it this way, or by adding an event listener to your DOM object.

<div onclick="openInNewTab('www.test.com');">Something To Click On</div>

Reference: Open a URL in a new tab using JavaScript

Set the target attribute of the link to _blank:

<a href="#" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Link</a>

For other examples, see here: http://www.w3schools.com/tags/att_a_target.asp

Note

I previously suggested blank instead of _blank because, if used, it'll open a new tab and then use the same tab if the link is clicked again. However, this is only because, as GolezTrol pointed out, it refers to the name a of a frame/window, which would be set and used when the link is pressed again to open it in the same tab.

Security Consideration!

The rel="noopener noreferrer" is to prevent the newly opened tab from being able to modify the original tab maliciously. For more information about this vulnerability read the following articles:

• The target="_blank" vulnerability by example
• External Links using target='_blank'

If I get you, you want your link to open the page in another tab.

You may use the target attribute of the link like this :

<a href="somepage.html" target=newtab>text</a>

If you want something you can type in the URL field of the browser, that is a bookmarklet, you may use this :

javascript: window.open('http://www.dystroy.org');

In most browsers, ctrl-click a link do the same thing.

EDIT :

If what you can modify is only the href attribute of the link, you can make this href be like this :

 <a href="javascript:window.open('http://www.dystroy.org');" target=_blank>text</a>

This just worked for me!

1. Create a Chrome extension (or you can use one that you've already coded).
2. Inside the manifest.json, include:

    "chrome_url_overrides": {
        "newtab": "newTabOverride.html"
    }

3. In the root folder of your extension, create a newTabOverride.html file that contains only this line: <meta http-equiv="refresh" content="0; url=http://www.example.com/" />

(I followed instructions from @PredatorIWD's answer here; I don't know why it was deleted. Maybe because it doesn't leave the cursor in the URL field to allow for a Google search.)

Also, you might want to just install an existing extension, if you trust it: https://github.com/jimschubert/NewTab-Redirect