diff --git a/frontend/src/lib/components/sidebar/navDetached.svelte.ts b/frontend/src/lib/components/sidebar/navDetached.svelte.ts
index a5213b0336..19568eaddc 100644
--- a/frontend/src/lib/components/sidebar/navDetached.svelte.ts
+++ b/frontend/src/lib/components/sidebar/navDetached.svelte.ts
@@ -2,19 +2,27 @@ import { fromStore } from 'svelte/store'
 import { userStore } from '$lib/stores'
 import { useLocalStorageValue } from '$lib/svelte5Utils.svelte'
 
-// Empty until the user presses detach or attach once. Until then operators start detached:
-// many of them navigate through a workspace's own app, and a docked sidebar would take its width.
-const pref = useLocalStorageValue<string>('nav_detached', '', 'string')
+// One preference per role rather than one per account. The same person is both — an operator in
+// one workspace, a developer in the next — and the two want different things from the sidebar, so
+// a single key would carry whichever was pressed last into the other role and never give it back.
+// Empty until that role presses detach or attach once.
+const operatorPref = useLocalStorageValue<string>('nav_detached_operator', '', 'string')
+const devPref = useLocalStorageValue<string>('nav_detached_dev', '', 'string')
 const user = fromStore(userStore)
 
 /** Whether the sidebar is detached: hidden behind a floating button that slides it in over the page. */
 export const navDetached = {
 	get val(): boolean {
+		// Unasked, operators start detached: many of them navigate through a workspace's own app,
+		// and a docked sidebar would take its width.
+		const operator = !!user.current?.operator
+		const pref = operator ? operatorPref : devPref
 		if (pref.val === 'true') return true
 		if (pref.val === 'false') return false
-		return !!user.current?.operator
+		return operator
 	},
 	set val(detached: boolean) {
+		const pref = user.current?.operator ? operatorPref : devPref
 		pref.val = String(detached)
 	}
 }