5 Awesome Google Chrome Extensions to Optimize Your Browsing Experience

In the recent years, Google Chrome has taken the browser market by storm, with over 62% of users now using Google Chrome (according to Oberlo). Most users view it as an easier, faster way to browse the internet. According to reports (source: Truelist), there are now over 176,608 different Chrome extensions available on the marketplace, however, the majority of Google Chrome users aren’t using any extensions.

If you’re willing to give them a try, browser extensions can be a real game-changer. They add features and functionality that’s just not possible with the default browser alone. Installation is a breeze, they can easily be accessed by using the top-right menu and then going to the Three Dots in the top-right > Extensions > Manage Extensions. You simply search for what you’d like, much like you do on a mobile device.

AdBlock

For several years, this has been the go-to extension for ad-blocking on the web. AdBlock effectively blocks the vast majority of ads across the web, including pop-ups, banner ads, and even video ads. After all, who actually wants to see ads? Recently, there has been a growing number of websites that won’t you let visit with an active ad-blocking extension. Luckily, it’s easy to allow any website/domain to be whitelisted, so you won’t be stopped just because of AdBlock.

The Great Suspender

As you may know, Google Chrome can be quite the memory hog if you’re a “tab-happy” user. Good news, there’s an extension just to help out with the memory usage of Google Chrome with multiple tabs open. The Great Suspender is an extension that suspends (unloads from memory) any tab that hasn’t been actively used for whatever period of time you have set (default is 1 hour). With a quick test of 20 tabs open, my normal usage was around 3700MB of memory used without the add-on. When The Great Suspender was active, memory usage was cut to around 1300MB with the identical tabs open. This represents a 60% savings in memory usage, making the computer able to perform other tasks faster.

Honey

If you’re an online shopper, Honey is worth installing. When you’re shopping online, you will see the Honey button light up if there are coupon codes for the site you are currently visiting in Honey’s massive database of coupon codes. With just one click, it will even copy the coupon code directly to your clipboard for easy copy/paste function. Overall, this plugin can save you time by already having coupons ready for you to try so you can maximize savings.

Awesome Screenshot

Ever need to take a quick screenshot, but don’t want to go through all of the trouble of using the old print-screen method? Awesome Screenshot allows you to get only the data you want to capture. Do you need just a small section? No problem. Do you need an entire page, even what’s not currently visible unless you scroll? There’s a function for that as well. Need to record a video screen capture? Awesome Screenshot has you covered.

In addition, you can highlight, add text and sketch on the screenshot without ever leaving Google Chrome! Awesome Screenshot is one of the most used tools in my browser. Once you get used to it, you’ll never do screenshots the old fashioned way again!

OneTab

This is another favorite of users (like me) who often have way too many tabs open. It gives you the ability to basically condense several tabs onto just one tab. For instance, if you are in the middle of researching to write a paper, you can have all of your precious research tabs saved into a OneTab while you’re finding a recipe for dinner. When you’re ready, you can restore the tabs exactly how they were before you condensed them. This helps to keep you organized when you have multiple tabs open.

Overall, there are tons of great Chrome extensions that add a lot of great features and functionality to Google Chrome. This is just a very small list of some of our favorites, and there are thousands more to explore.

If you have any questions about anything tech-related, feel free to contact SandStorm IT at 901-475-0275.