Welcome back everyone, I think you're all going to really enjoy this video.
After a lot of digging, I've found 13 really cool chrome extensions that I think you should
know about.
A couple of these are pretty well known, but I'm sure that most of these will be new to
you, and they definitely were for me.
And if you want even more extensions, at the end I'll put a link to my previous video I
made about this with some cool ones.
And of course before we begin I'm gonna give a quick shoutout to my Instagram account,
I try to only post quality content on there, if you want to check it out, my username is
just @ThioJoe.
So now, let's get started.
Starting off with number 1, we have a very cool extension called "Turn off the lights".
What this does, is when you're watching a video on YouTube, or Vimeo, or really any
other website, it will darken the screen around the video.
So maybe you're watching a long video, and don't necessarily want to go full screen,
this will let you tune out any other distractions on the page.
And for an extension that's so simple, there is a surprising amount of options, such as
how dark it gets, the ability to also blur the surrounding parts, exclude certain parts
of the YouTube page from being darkened, such as the like button, and a bunch of other stuff.
Definitely one to check out.
Next up, is Chrome User Agent Switcher, which is actually an extension made by Google.
Some of you may know what this one does right off the bat, but if you don't know what a
User Agent Switcher is, it basically changes the "fingerprint" of your browser, so websites
will think you're using something else, like Firefox, or Safari.
This can be useful for those annoying websites that block you because you're not using a
"supported browser" even if Chrome is fully capable.
Or maybe for some reason you want to pretend like you're using a mobile web browser, like
when developing a website, you can switch to iOS or Android as well.
There are several to choose from, but I should point out this doesn't actually change anything
about your browser itself, and doesn't offer any privacy, it simply changes what browser
you tell the website you're using.
Moving on, we have Honey.
This one is a really cool idea, where whenever you go to buy something online, once you get
to the checkout page, this extension will automatically try several coupon codes to
see if there are any discounts you didn't know about.
It apparently supports hundreds of online stores, and while it obviously isn't going
to find a working coupon every time, it is nice every once in a while you'll randomly
see that you saved money because of some coupon you didn't know about.
So you just kind of set it and forget it and it might save you money later and get a nice
surprise.
Ok number 4 is a really interesting one made by Google called "Long Descriptions in Context
Menu".
I didn't know this, but apparently it's possible for websites to embed long descriptions of
images, typically used for people who are visually impaired and has a screen reader,
so it tells them what the image is.
This is different from "alt text" that you can see by hovering over an image, and unless
you know about these long descriptions, they're totally invisible.
And so, well like the title suggests, this extension makes it so you can right click
an image and view the long description if it has one, or if you don't want to check
every time, it can outline images that do have one so you can see right off the bat.
Now these long descriptions are very rare, and probaly not very useful to most, but I
thought it was something you might want to at least know about.
Next up, we have Chrome Connectivity Diagnostics, yet another one made by Google, though technically
it's a chrome "app", not an extension, but whatever.
The title is self explanatory, this app allows you to run a simple test of your internet
connection through chrome.
So if your internet seems to be really slow, or it's not working at all, you can run this
and it should be able to tell you where things are going wrong.
Whether certain ports are blocked, if DNS servers are working, and a bunch of other
stuff as well.
Certainly a good one to have just in case I think.
Alright, 6 is Grammarly, an extension that has actually gotten pretty popular.
In simple terms, it's a spell checker, but obviously there's a little bit more to it.
Whenever you type something in on a website, whether it's to post on Twitter, Facebook,
or an email, it will automatically scan the message to see if there's anything you might
want to change.
And it won't autocorrect, just tell you.
You'll see if it's working because in the bottom right of the form you'll see the little
symbol, and it will be green or red depending on what it found.
This is one to consider if you're prone to lots of typos.
Numero 7, TrafficLight.
No, this has nothing to do with driving, but rather it's a security app made by Bitdefender,
which you maybe familiar with.
The idea for this is it just runs in the background, and scans any websites you visit for malicious
elements.
But the cool thing about this is if a website only has some malicious parts, it will only
block those parts.
That way you aren't totally blocked from going on the site, but you shouldn't be exposed
either.
By default it also scans search results, but you can turn that off it you don't like seeing
all the check marks it adds in the results.
I turned that off personally.
Also, it will let you know if there are any tracking elements on the site, like from Facebook
or something like that.
I think this is a good way to supplement your current antivirus software, which you should
all have.
Ok, moving on, here's one you probably haven't heard of, Forest.
It's a productivity app with a unique concept.
Instead of just blocking distracting websites, it turns it into a game.
When you need to get work done, you start a timer, and plant a virtual tree.
As the timer continues, the tree grows, until the timer ends, and you add that tree to your
collection, because it's fully grown.
But here's the thing.
If you go on any distracted websites that you've blocked, the tree dies and you have
to start it over.
Now there's also a mobile app which does the same thing except for apps instead of websites.
That has a lot more features and you can sync the browser extension it, plus it shows you
an actual virtual forest of the trees you've grown, it's kind of cool.
But to sync the two you need the premium version, which is $2, not that much, you might still
want to look into that as well.
Next, number 9, this is really just useless but kinda funny, and it's called Tabby Cat.
Basically it changes Chrome so whenever you create a new blank tab, it will show you a
cat.
It's a different one every time, and you'll get random drops of gifts an accessories you
can use to customize the cats.
So far I've gotten a fishbone which I think is a starting item, and a hat.
But yea doesn't really do anything, it's just a fun little extension, but you might like
it.
Ok, so with all these extensions you have, this next one will come in real handy.
It's called Extensity, and the purpose is to make it easy to enable and disable chrome
apps on the fly.
Not uninstall them mind you, just turn them off.
You just click on the icon and it will show you a whole list of extensions and apps, and
you just click them to toggle them on and off.
The nice thing about this is normally to disable extensions, you have to navigate to the extensions
page in chrome, find it in the list, and click the check box.
And a reason you might do this is so you can keep a lot of extensions you like installed,
but maybe there are a few that you rarely use, but don't want to completely uninstall
it.
Now, you can just disable it so it doesn't take up any system resources all the time,
and whenever you do need it, just enable it.
Very useful.
Number 11, I think everyone is gonna like this one.
It's called BehindTheOverlay.
Have you ever gone on a webpage that has something you're looking for, but all of a sudden, you
get a pop up blocking you from seeing the site unless you sign up for an account or
something like that.
It's really frustrating because you can see the information right there, but they won't
let you see the whole thing.
Well this extension fixes that.
You click the extension icon, and it removes the overlay, letting you see the webpage as
normal.
This will also work for overlays trying to get you to sign up for email newsletters,
the ones with nearly impossible to find close buttons like that.
Keep in mind though, this will not work if the website is coded so that the content is
not actually shown behind the overlay.
Even if you remove the overlay in that case, it might only show you a small part, because
the rest was never there to begin with.
Still, I think I'll find myself using this one a lot.
Coming near the end, number 12 is Showgoers for Netflix.
This one is actually awesome.
It lets you sync up Netflix shows and movies with friends, so you can all watch the same
thing at the same time.
How it works is once you log into Netflix and start playing something, then click on
the glasses icon at the top right.
You then have the option to start a new watch party, or even browse public ones made by
other people.
You get a few options, and then it gives you a link to share with anyone to let them join
the chatroom.
Obviously everyone watching has to have this extension and an active netflix account for
this to work.
It's not like it creates a stream, it just keeps you all synced up.
Really neat.
And finally, 13 is AHA Music Identifier.
It's basically like Shazam or Soundhound, except as an extension, where it can identify
songs playing on a website or in a video you're watching or something like that.
If there's any audio playing in a tab, you click the icon, and it starts listening.
And you probably need about 10 seconds of sample time for it to work.
If it finds it, it will show you the name, and links to where you can listen to it, like
YouTube and Spotify.
Obviously you could just use an app on your phone to identify it, but then you have to
grab your phone, go to the app, hold it up to the speakers, it's kind of a pain, whereas
here it's very simple.
The only thing to point out is when you install it, Chrome will tell you that this app will
try to start up with windows, even if chrome is closed.
I don't like apps that do that, so you can prevent that from happening by going to Chrome
Settings, then advanced, and then under System, disable the option that says, "Continue running
background apps when Google Chrome is closed".
And now you should be set.
So, there you have it.
13 Chrome extensions you might not have known about but hopefully find cool.
If I missed any really cool ones, be sure to let me know and everyone else in the comments.
If you want to keep watching I'll put some other videos right here, like even more extensions.
If you want to subscribe, I make a few new videos every week, and also consider enabling
notifications or else YouTube might not show you them anyway.
But anyway, as usual guys, I'm looking forward to hearing from you, so thanks for watching
I'll see you next time, and have a good one.