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Browser Extensions I Use Every Day

I love improving my workflow via browser extensions. I’ve written about some great extensions in the past, and since then have continued to refine my collection.

Fast-forward 10 years of web development, and I’ve got the number of extensions down from 30+ to around eight per browser. These are essential extensions that I actually use every day. They make my online work/life much easier.

There are a ton of amazing and useful browser addons for Chrome, Firefox, Brave, and many other browsers. Years ago, I would install every awesome extension that I could find. You know, just to have it. These days, I follow a much more minimalist path. I don’t install any extension or app unless:

  1. It is 100% necessary
  2. I trust the developer/provider

Following this path has led to the following collection of essential extensions. Organized by browser:

Chrome extensions

I use Chrome as my primary work browser. That means a LOT of web development and testing, inspecting source code, and troubleshooting. The following extensions help to make it happen. Ordered by frequency of use.

Firefox extensions

I use Firefox mostly for leisure, watching video, downloading media, and so forth. So these extensions are aimed mostly in that direction. Ordered by frequency of use.

Brave extension

Currently, I use Brave for all social media stuff. And pretty much only social media stuff. So not a lot of use for extensions. There is one important extension I use with Brave, to disable the hideously invasive Download Bar. It. Is. So. Annoying. Ask literally anyone. It suuucks. So only one essential extension for Brave:

Other browsers

In addition to the above, I run a bunch of browsers just for testing the consistency of web designs. Other browsers such as Opera, Safari, Vivaldi, Waterfox, and the usual bunch of mobile browsers running on Android and iOS.

Fortunately, extensions are not needed for testing web designs. Code Inspector really is all that’s necessary. So it helps to lighten my load, as I never install or worry about extensions for any browsers other than Chrome, Firefox, and Brave, all on desktop. Just the above 17 extensions and done.

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4 responses to “Browser Extensions I Use Every Day”

  1. hi again Jeff!

    re: Popup Blocker Ultimate, AdBlocker Ultimate, Disable JavaScript, i would highly recommend replacing all these with uBlock Origin by Raymond Hill – be sure to read the wiki (i also have a config guide on my site)

    re: HTTP Header Live, JavaScript Errors Notifier: not sure these helpful for Firefox??? – i would guess the info you want is available in the built-in developer tools

    re: Video DownloadHelper: look up yts-dl – it’s powerful, command-line downloader – very easy to use

    if privacy is an issue, consider the ‘arkenfox’ user.js for Firefox or, if you want an easier route, consider LibreWolf which incorporates some of the ‘arkenfox’ prefs and uBlock Origin by default

    if neither interests you, at least set Enhanced Tracking Protection to ‘Strict’ and enable ‘privacy.resistFingerprinting’ in about:config – this will break some sites, but you can always spin up a default profile for that

    also be aware that Firefox — and only Firefox apparently — stated that they will continue to support Manifest v2 for extensions – this is important regarding ad/content blockers

    for (a lot) more, see the stuff on my site @ 12bytes.org/articles/tech/

    • Jeff Starr 2023/01/17 2:29 pm

      Hey 12bytes, thanks for all the great feedbacks. I have tried uBlock but didn’t like it. Too many issues and weird quirks, sites not working, etc. It was a while ago so maybe I should give it another try. Always looking to improve my setup, especially where security/privacy stuff is concerns.

      HTTP Header Live and JavaScript Errors Notifier are both useful on Firefox for my particular workflow. I like having a dedicated HTTP sniffer and display JS errors visibly on the browser bar.

      Thanks for the tip on yts-dl, will check it. Also arkenfox user.js looks very useful. Also thanks for all the work you do at 12bytes.org, tons of great content there.

      • uBlock is quite powerful, but using it to its full extent requires some reading – the wiki will come in handy for sure

        you will be interacting with it quite a bit until you make the adjustments for the sites you visit most often, after which less work is involved – it is the best content blocker out there at the moment

        the arkenfox user.js is also the best user.js out there for Firefox that i know of – there’s quite a few very knowledgeable and capable people involved in the project, but again, using it will cause some websites to break and so it can be handy to keep a relaxed profile at the ready for such occasions

        if you’ve read any of my stuff, you’ll know that i strongly dislike Mozilla as a company

        ALL modern web browsers are crap, but that said, Firefox is the best of them for those concerned with privacy because it is so tweakable and because it still supports manifest v2

      • Jeff Starr 2023/01/17 3:49 pm

        Thanks for all the information. I really only use Firefox for casual browsing and movies, etc. But uBlock may be worth another try at some point if my current extensions end up falling short. Definitely will keep it in mind, thank you 12bytes.

        PS: you mention “ALL modern web browsers are crap”.. what do you think about Brave browser?

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