15 - Seven simple tips that will make you faster with Google Chrome
Make tab groups for better organization
Select multiple tabs in Chrome while holding the CTRL key. Right click on any of the selected tabs and select Add Tabs to Group. You can name it whatever you want or leave it blank.
Why use this? If you have a ton of tabs open it makes it more organized especially because you can “minimize” all the tabs in the group, and it shows nice label for the group that can be expanded later.
Another option is using pins. Right click your desired tab and click Pin. It will make a small tab on the left side that can be used at any time.
Search Your Tabs Quickly
Ctrl + Shift + A will bring up a menu showing all your open tabs. You can type your keyword immediately to search among your open tabs or you can scroll down the list.
Seach Your History Quickly
Ctrl + H and start typing whatever you’re looking for. Many times, I’ve wanted to go back on to something I saw earlier. Using this trick makes it a cinch.
Search Your Bookmarks Quickly
Ctrl + Shift + O and start typing whatever you’re looking for or you can manually find and click your bookmark. I sometimes use this if there’s something I bookmarked but have trouble finding.
Create custom engines for easy lookups
I like using this shortcut for shopping sites and for my local library.
Go to Chrome Settings
Click on Search engine then on Manage search engines and site search
Scroll down to the Site search section and click Add
Type in the search engine name. This is just a title and it’s arbitrary.
Next comes the shortcut name. This is what you’ll type in the search bar to do a quick search. In this example it’s simply “amazon”.
The last piece is figuring out the search URL. You figure out how the URL does search queries on your chosen site and add a placeholder %s in place of the query. In this example I found an example from Amazon, and I replaced the remainder with %s as the query placeholder. Chrome will take your search item and place it where the %s goes in the URL.
After saving your setup go to the address bar to test it. Type in the shortcut you named and press Tab or Space. Then type whatever you want to search for on the URL and press Enter. It will automatically search the site for you.
Use keyboard shortcuts to go faster
Chrome has loads of keyboard shortcuts that make life easier. There’re all listed here but these are a few that I use all the time.
Ctrl + L to jump to the address bar and search
Ctrl + Shift + T to resurrect a recently closed tab
Middle click a link to open it in a new tab
Use Chrome Extensions to Make it 10x Better
Chrome Extensions are small programs made by independent developers and are approved by Google to use within Chrome. The creativity on these is endless and make Chrome such a usable and productive tool. Here are my own favorites.
Dark Reader will automatically make pages in dark mode. I like to use its automatic scheduling feature, so it turns on at night and turns off during the day. It really saves my eyes from strong white glares during the evening.
Feedly Mini. I use this in conjunction with my Feedly account to save articles to read later.
Infy Scroll prevents having to click “next page” on many websites including Google and Amazon. Such a simple concept but it makes internet browsing much easier.
Keepa. I mentioned this in my last newsletter, and I never shop on Amazon without using its helpful pricing charts.
Library Extension loads on any Amazon and Goodreads book page and will automatically let me know if my local library has a copy. Handy!
Microsoft Editor. A great spelling and grammar checker. I find it’s better than the standard tool Chrome includes.
Shazam identifies any song playing in the tab. This is useful if I’m watching a video and I’m trying to figure out the background music.
Pushpin. I like to pin frequently used websites. Unfortunately, Chrome doesn’t do an excellent job of retaining those pinned sites after a restart so this helpful app will make sure they stick.
SingleFile will download a webpage copy for any site. This is handy for reference or archiving purposes. I find it’s better than making a screenshot.
WasteNoTime puts a timer for websites I feel isn’t the best use of my time. After the time limit is hit for the day, it will prevent you from visiting those websites. This helps me fight procrastination.