Top 10 Google Chrome plugins for 2020 -- in pictures
LastPass
I don't know how I would manage without LastPass as my password manager. It's on every device I own, and thanks to extensions, built into the browsers I use. After years of flitting from one password manager to another, I finally found the one that worked for me.
The extension not only gives me access to my passwords, but also simplifies tasks such as creating new strong passwords, and keeping an eye on compromised passwords.
If you're not using a password manager -- and you really should be! -- then I suggest you take LastPass for a spin. Highly recommended.
Visualping
This extension allows you to keep an eye out for changes to web pages. It can inform you whenever a particular page changes without you having to sit there hitting the refresh button continuously.
It can even show you what the differences are.
I have a long list of websites that I keep an eye on using this tool, and so far, it has worked flawlessly.
F.B.(FluffBusting) Purity
Without this, the Facebook interface is a trashfire. It worked great with the old interface, and brings a lot of that functionality to the new Facebook interface.
This extension can be set to hide all the ads, game spam, sponsored posts and other annoying stuff on Facebook, making it a bit more tolerable.
Tab Wrangler
Automatically closes inactive tabs and makes it easy to get them back. Sounds like a small thing, but when you look at how much RAM Google Chrome can consume, this can make the difference between a computer that feels snappy and one that feels like it's swimming through molasses.
- Automatically closes idle tabs after designated time
- Saves closed tabs, easy to re-open
- Chrome sync saves settings between computers
- Doesn't close pinned tabs
- Lock tabs from closing
Session Buddy
Session Buddy is what bookmarks in browsers should have become by now, but haven't. It's a session manager for your browser that is a one-stop-shop for making you more productive:
- See all open tabs in one place.
- Save open tabs and restore them later. Great for freeing up memory and avoiding tab clutter.
- Recover open tabs after a browser or system crash.
- Organize links by topic and find them when you need them with keyword search.
- Easily consolidate link sets and eliminate duplicates.
- Export link sets in a variety of text formats for use in email messages, documents, spreadsheets, and online posts.
- Create sessions from a list of URLs.
Tampermonkey
There's so much power built into this one extension. Tampermonkey allows you to customize web pages by downloading and installing userscripts. It's one of those extensions that once you start experimenting with it, you'll end up wanting to customize every page you regularly visit.
What it can do is really limited by the scripts available, or, if you decide to make scripts yourself, your imagination! If you're not careful, this extesnion can quickly become a hobby!
Office Editing for Docs, Sheets, and Slides
View and edit Microsoft Word, Excel, and PowerPoint files, all without needing Office installed on your computer.
Once the extension is installed, Office files that you drag into Chrome, open in Gmail, Google Drive, and more, will be opened in Docs, Sheets, and Slides for viewing and editing.
Massive timesaver!
Bot Sentinel
Twitter is my social media platform of choice, but sadly it's is increasingly turning into a cesspool of garbage, especially in relation to politics. Bot Sentinel automatically detect and track trollbots and untrustworthy Twitter accounts.
This service helps make Twitter a nicer place by highlighting the bots and untrustworthy accounts.
Turn Off The Lights
This is basically dark mode for video sites such as YouTube, Vimeo, Dailymotion, and Hulu. It basically dims all the noise around the video, allowing you to focus on the video.
Very simple, but very effective, especially for longer video viewing sessions maybe when learning or chilling.
Partizion
I've only been using this service (it's a paid service) a while, but I'm seriously impressed by it.
Partizion is a plugin that allows me to condense down my myriad of tabs into workspaces (think home, work, plans, hobbies), and then further refine and distill that down to collections (so maybe email, social media, research, etc). The workspaces allow me to shift between what I'm working on quickly, while collections allow me to open and close a bundle of tabs with as little as a click.
For me, this has become a huge productivity and performance booster.