Hiding tab headers on a TabControl in C#

After browsing around a little bit, I found an interesting solution if you need to hide the tab headers on a tab control. I found it here, posted on the MSDN social forums by “nobugz” (Hans Passant). Here is his solution:

class YourTabControl : TabControl{
    protected override void WndProc(ref Message m){
        // Hide tabs by trapping the TCM_ADJUSTRECT message
        if (m.Msg == 0x1328 && !DesignMode)
            m.Result = (IntPtr)1;
        else
            base.WndProc(ref m);
    }
}

Basically, you define your own class that extends TabControl. The custom class overrides the WndProc method, which is responsible for processing Windows messages sent to windows and controls. The new version filters out the message which is responsible for drawing the tab headers. Very clever.

To use it, you can make a normal TabControl using the designer. Then, in the Designer code, change the following line (in the InitializeComponent method):

this.tabControl1 =  new System.Windows.Forms.TabControl();

to

this.tabControl1 =  new YourTabControl();

Finally, near the bottom of the Designer code should be a line that looks like this:

private System.Windows.Forms.TabControl tabControl1;

Change it to:

private YourTabControl tabControl1;

Another clever thing about this is that, as you will notice, tab headers are still visible while in Design mode.