Google Chrome The Google Chrome browser has now become the most used browser in the world, not only because it is safe and easy to use, but above all for its functions that go far beyond simply reading web pages.
It is therefore worth going to discover options and tricks for Chrome to know in order to use the best tools included in the Google browser on Windows and Mac PC and also on Android and iPhone smartphones.
These tools can improve the usability of the browser and offer greater efficiency when browsing the web .
In this article we see at least 20 tricks for Chrome, improve the performance of the Google web browser, to use useful internal tools and make browsing on websites from PC or mobile phone less boring and faster.
READ ALSO: Hidden Chrome settings to modify
1) Always stay in private browsing with the Incognito mode .
Private or incognito browsing deactivates the history and cookies that are not stored and are not used during the session.
Private browsing is a useful tool for a higher level of privacy .
To open a new window in Incognito you can go to the options button at the top right (the three dots) or you can press the key combination Ctrl + Shift + N.
In Windows 7 and Windows 10 you can start an Incognito window directly from the desktop taskbar by right clicking on the Chrome icon on the taskbar and pressing " New incognito window ".
You can also open a link directly in Incognito from a regular Chrome session by right-clicking on the link and choosing " Open link in Incognito window ".
You can start Chrome in incognito mode by default by creating a new shortcut on the Chrome desktop, right click, go to the properties and, in the Destination field, at the end of the line type " --incognito " (with space, without quotation marks).
This link launches the Chrome browser always in private mode.
As seen, you can also use an extension to browse incognito with Chrome only on some websites .
From the extensions menu, you can decide which ones to enable in incognito navigation but it would be better not to use them if you want to maintain privacy.
READ ALSO: Use Chrome's launch parameters (dashes -)
2) Allow extensions under cover
When browsing incognito, extensions are not enabled by default, but you can still have them by activating them.
If you want to use an extension in incognito mode, open the extensions management page (" chrome: // extensions / ") and press the " Details " button of the extension to be activated incognito.
From the tab, activate the " Allow incognito " option.
3) Use the keyboard and combinations to navigate faster .
There are at least 30 hotkeys or keyboard shortcut combinations to activate Chrome options and browse web pages.
The complete list of keyboard shortcuts can be read on this page .
4) Add and modify search engines
Chrome uses Google as the default search engine but you can add other specific search engines for each website and assign it shortcut keys.
In Settings, go under Search Engines to find the ones added and add new ones.
For example
The search engine is called up by writing the keyword on the address bar, followed by the text to search for.
4 BIS) Search for emails directly from the address bar
Using the process seen above it is possible to create a personalized search for the Gmail account in order to find the emails directly from the address bar of the browser.
To add this custom search bar, go to the search engine addition page, enter the name and enter the URL:
//mail.google.com/mail/ca/u/0/#search/%s
READ ALSO: On Chrome, 10 ways to use the Omnibox search bar
6) Open pdf with Chrome as already reported some article ago.
7) Add shortcuts to favorite sites on the desktop
You can transform the sites visited with Chrome into desktop applications by going to the main menu with three dots in the upper right corner, going to Other Tools -> create application shortcut .
7 BIS) You can also add websites to your home screen on your mobile phone (on Android and iPhone)
This is a very useful trick to keep your favorite sites even more just a click away.
Chrome allows you to add site shortcuts on the home screen like so:
To create these shortcuts, visit the website, tap the three-dot menu and tap the " Add to Home screen " option.
9) Reopen the tabs closed by mistake immediately
If a tab was closed by mistake, perhaps of a site that does not remember the address, without going into the history, you can reopen it quickly and immediately by pressing the CTRL-Shift-T keys.
Pressing CTRL-Shift-T several times will reopen the tabs closed backwards in the history.
10) Quickly clear your browser history
To prevent a curious person from discovering the sites visited by us or when using the computer of a friend or another person, you may wish to delete any data from the session.
To do it ultra fast, just press the CTRL-Shift-Del keys and then confirm, in the window that appears, the deletion of all data in the history.
11) Zoom to enlarge a page
If you have a large monitor, you can better read the small written web pages using the Zoom commands that are on the main menu.
To do it first, just hold down the CTRL key and then move the mouse wheel.
Zoom only applies to that site and not to others.
The general zoom and zoom options are in Chrome's settings.
12 Secret settings and Chrome: // advanced tools were explained in another article.
The most important is Chrome: // flags to enable or disable experimental browser functions.
Chrome: // crash ends a stuck tab (who knew it raise your hand!)
Chrome: // memory is Chrome's task manager, to see which plugins and extensions consume more memory and slow down the browser.
On the memory page, if there are other browsers open, you can make a comparison on the memory consumption between Chrome and the others.
Chrome: // about lists all the dozens of Chrome About pages.
13) Prevent Chrome from keeping apps running in the background when it's closed
Not many people know this, but by default, Chrome runs all of its apps in the background.
This can be useful in some cases (for example for notifications from Gmail), but in general it is better to disable the function and avoid that the apps remain active in the background by consuming memory.
To get it open Chrome, go to Settings -> Advanced and disable the option " Continue to run applications in the background after closing Google Chrome ".
14) Enable / disable automatic compilation on Chrome on PC, Android and iPhone
The automatic filling of Chrome, on PC and mobile phones, allows you to automatically write items such as passwords, addresses, payment information and more.
To see the automatic filling preferences, open Settings and check the " Password ", " Payment methods " and " Addresses and more " options. Here you will find the saved information, along with a switch for automatic filling of data on websites. You can turn off this option to turn off autofill in Chrome Mobile.
14 BIS) Add / Remove payment methods
Whenever you use a credit or debit card to buy online using the Google Chrome browser, you can save numbers to speed up your purchase.
If we are connected to our Google account and we are sure that no one else uses Chrome with our account, then it is okay to store the credit card information to buy quickly, also because the data will also be synchronized with all the devices we use, including the smartphone. .
In Settings> Payment methods, you can save one or more payment methods in Chrome and have them saved in the Google account.
14 TRIS) Address management
As with payment information, Chrome also saves other personal details such as your home address and phone number and email, to facilitate automatic filling in website forms.
To add these data, delete them or even to correct them, go to the Addresses section in Chrome Settings and more .
This option is really useful for speeding up the filling of online registration forms.
READ ALSO: Lock Chrome with password to protect private data
17) Activate Chrome data saver on PC and mobile phone
If you have a limited data plan, you can make Chrome save traffic when uploading websites and images.
To enable this setting go to Settings -> Data saving and activate the switch.
To do the same on PC you need to install an extension.
18) Enable the guest profile to browse more privately
If you use a public computer or a friend, to maintain the privacy of what you do, you can open an incognito session or use a guest profile.
When you browse the Internet using a guest profile, the pages displayed do not appear in the browser history and leave no other traces, such as cookies, on the computer after it is closed.
Furthermore, Guest profiles do not have access to the personal data of the main profile.
To explore Chrome in Guest mode, press on the profile icon at the top right and then on " Open guest window ".
Once finished, close all Guest windows and the navigation information will be removed.
19) Disable notifications for all sites
One of the most annoying things about surfing the Internet are requests to send notifications from most of the websites you visit.
This is very annoying and becomes a real problem when allowing an uninteresting website to send notifications.
However, there is a trick to prevent sites from sending notifications and also to block the appearance of pop-ups asking for permission to enable the notification.
In Settings, go then under the Privacy and security section, then go to Content Settings and then to Notifications .
You will then be able to see all the sites authorized to send notifications and those blocked.
The top option can be set to block notifications completely forever.
20) Activate Safe Browsing
The internet is full of malicious websites, so Chrome tries to protect internet browsing by blocking them before they can load.
The safe browsing tool built into Chrome is located in Settings -> Privacy .
21) Check spelling
In Chrome you can activate the spelling checker of Chrome in Italian, English and other languages.
READ ALSO: Cheats and main functions for Chrome on Android and iPhone / iPad
It is therefore worth going to discover options and tricks for Chrome to know in order to use the best tools included in the Google browser on Windows and Mac PC and also on Android and iPhone smartphones.
These tools can improve the usability of the browser and offer greater efficiency when browsing the web .
In this article we see at least 20 tricks for Chrome, improve the performance of the Google web browser, to use useful internal tools and make browsing on websites from PC or mobile phone less boring and faster.
READ ALSO: Hidden Chrome settings to modify
1) Always stay in private browsing with the Incognito mode .
Private or incognito browsing deactivates the history and cookies that are not stored and are not used during the session.
Private browsing is a useful tool for a higher level of privacy .
To open a new window in Incognito you can go to the options button at the top right (the three dots) or you can press the key combination Ctrl + Shift + N.
In Windows 7 and Windows 10 you can start an Incognito window directly from the desktop taskbar by right clicking on the Chrome icon on the taskbar and pressing " New incognito window ".
You can also open a link directly in Incognito from a regular Chrome session by right-clicking on the link and choosing " Open link in Incognito window ".
You can start Chrome in incognito mode by default by creating a new shortcut on the Chrome desktop, right click, go to the properties and, in the Destination field, at the end of the line type " --incognito " (with space, without quotation marks).
This link launches the Chrome browser always in private mode.
As seen, you can also use an extension to browse incognito with Chrome only on some websites .
From the extensions menu, you can decide which ones to enable in incognito navigation but it would be better not to use them if you want to maintain privacy.
READ ALSO: Use Chrome's launch parameters (dashes -)
2) Allow extensions under cover
When browsing incognito, extensions are not enabled by default, but you can still have them by activating them.
If you want to use an extension in incognito mode, open the extensions management page (" chrome: // extensions / ") and press the " Details " button of the extension to be activated incognito.
From the tab, activate the " Allow incognito " option.
3) Use the keyboard and combinations to navigate faster .
There are at least 30 hotkeys or keyboard shortcut combinations to activate Chrome options and browse web pages.
| Hot key | What does he do |
|---|---|
| F1 | Load the Chrome help |
| Ctrl + J | View the Downloads |
| Ctrl + H | Chronology |
| Ctrl + D | Add Favorite |
| Ctrl + F | Opens the search on the page |
| Ctrl + P | |
| Ctrl + T | New tab |
| Ctrl + W | Closes tab |
| Ctrl ++ | Zoom in |
| Ctrl + - | Zoom out |
| Ctrl + 0 | default zoom |
| Ctrl + Shift + T | Reopen the last closed tabs |
| Ctrl + N | New window |
| Ctrl + Shift + N | New incognito window |
| Ctrl + Tab | Switch between tabs |
| Ctrl + Shift + Tab | From tab to tab from right to left |
| Ctrl + 1-8 | Displays the first from the right, the second the third |
| Ctrl + 9 | View the last tab from the left |
| Ctrl + Shift + Del | Opens the clear history window |
| Ctrl + Shift + B | Show and hide the bookmarks bar |
| Shift + Esc | Chrome's internal task manager |
| Alt + Home | home page |
| Alt + D / Ctrl + L | Highlight the URL on the address bar |
| Ctrl + Enter | adds www. and .com to the text on the address bar |
| Ctrl + Shift + V | Paste from clipboard without formatting |
| Ctrl + U | View the source code of the page you are viewing; |
4) Add and modify search engines
Chrome uses Google as the default search engine but you can add other specific search engines for each website and assign it shortcut keys.
In Settings, go under Search Engines to find the ones added and add new ones.
For example
Name: BingThis way you can automatically search within websites without having to open or browse them, directly from the address bar of Google Chrome.
Keyword: b
Url: //www.bing.com/search?setmkt=it-IT&q=%s
The search engine is called up by writing the keyword on the address bar, followed by the text to search for.
4 BIS) Search for emails directly from the address bar
Using the process seen above it is possible to create a personalized search for the Gmail account in order to find the emails directly from the address bar of the browser.
To add this custom search bar, go to the search engine addition page, enter the name and enter the URL:
//mail.google.com/mail/ca/u/0/#search/%s
READ ALSO: On Chrome, 10 ways to use the Omnibox search bar
6) Open pdf with Chrome as already reported some article ago.
7) Add shortcuts to favorite sites on the desktop
You can transform the sites visited with Chrome into desktop applications by going to the main menu with three dots in the upper right corner, going to Other Tools -> create application shortcut .
7 BIS) You can also add websites to your home screen on your mobile phone (on Android and iPhone)
This is a very useful trick to keep your favorite sites even more just a click away.
Chrome allows you to add site shortcuts on the home screen like so:
To create these shortcuts, visit the website, tap the three-dot menu and tap the " Add to Home screen " option.
9) Reopen the tabs closed by mistake immediately
If a tab was closed by mistake, perhaps of a site that does not remember the address, without going into the history, you can reopen it quickly and immediately by pressing the CTRL-Shift-T keys.
Pressing CTRL-Shift-T several times will reopen the tabs closed backwards in the history.
10) Quickly clear your browser history
To prevent a curious person from discovering the sites visited by us or when using the computer of a friend or another person, you may wish to delete any data from the session.
To do it ultra fast, just press the CTRL-Shift-Del keys and then confirm, in the window that appears, the deletion of all data in the history.
11) Zoom to enlarge a page
If you have a large monitor, you can better read the small written web pages using the Zoom commands that are on the main menu.
To do it first, just hold down the CTRL key and then move the mouse wheel.
Zoom only applies to that site and not to others.
The general zoom and zoom options are in Chrome's settings.
12 Secret settings and Chrome: // advanced tools were explained in another article.
The most important is Chrome: // flags to enable or disable experimental browser functions.
Chrome: // crash ends a stuck tab (who knew it raise your hand!)
Chrome: // memory is Chrome's task manager, to see which plugins and extensions consume more memory and slow down the browser.
On the memory page, if there are other browsers open, you can make a comparison on the memory consumption between Chrome and the others.
Chrome: // about lists all the dozens of Chrome About pages.
13) Prevent Chrome from keeping apps running in the background when it's closed
Not many people know this, but by default, Chrome runs all of its apps in the background.
This can be useful in some cases (for example for notifications from Gmail), but in general it is better to disable the function and avoid that the apps remain active in the background by consuming memory.
To get it open Chrome, go to Settings -> Advanced and disable the option " Continue to run applications in the background after closing Google Chrome ".
14) Enable / disable automatic compilation on Chrome on PC, Android and iPhone
The automatic filling of Chrome, on PC and mobile phones, allows you to automatically write items such as passwords, addresses, payment information and more.
To see the automatic filling preferences, open Settings and check the " Password ", " Payment methods " and " Addresses and more " options. Here you will find the saved information, along with a switch for automatic filling of data on websites. You can turn off this option to turn off autofill in Chrome Mobile.
14 BIS) Add / Remove payment methods
Whenever you use a credit or debit card to buy online using the Google Chrome browser, you can save numbers to speed up your purchase.
If we are connected to our Google account and we are sure that no one else uses Chrome with our account, then it is okay to store the credit card information to buy quickly, also because the data will also be synchronized with all the devices we use, including the smartphone. .
In Settings> Payment methods, you can save one or more payment methods in Chrome and have them saved in the Google account.
14 TRIS) Address management
As with payment information, Chrome also saves other personal details such as your home address and phone number and email, to facilitate automatic filling in website forms.
To add these data, delete them or even to correct them, go to the Addresses section in Chrome Settings and more .
This option is really useful for speeding up the filling of online registration forms.
READ ALSO: Lock Chrome with password to protect private data
17) Activate Chrome data saver on PC and mobile phone
If you have a limited data plan, you can make Chrome save traffic when uploading websites and images.
To enable this setting go to Settings -> Data saving and activate the switch.
To do the same on PC you need to install an extension.
18) Enable the guest profile to browse more privately
If you use a public computer or a friend, to maintain the privacy of what you do, you can open an incognito session or use a guest profile.
When you browse the Internet using a guest profile, the pages displayed do not appear in the browser history and leave no other traces, such as cookies, on the computer after it is closed.
Furthermore, Guest profiles do not have access to the personal data of the main profile.
To explore Chrome in Guest mode, press on the profile icon at the top right and then on " Open guest window ".
Once finished, close all Guest windows and the navigation information will be removed.
19) Disable notifications for all sites
One of the most annoying things about surfing the Internet are requests to send notifications from most of the websites you visit.
This is very annoying and becomes a real problem when allowing an uninteresting website to send notifications.
However, there is a trick to prevent sites from sending notifications and also to block the appearance of pop-ups asking for permission to enable the notification.
In Settings, go then under the Privacy and security section, then go to Content Settings and then to Notifications .
You will then be able to see all the sites authorized to send notifications and those blocked.
The top option can be set to block notifications completely forever.
20) Activate Safe Browsing
The internet is full of malicious websites, so Chrome tries to protect internet browsing by blocking them before they can load.
The safe browsing tool built into Chrome is located in Settings -> Privacy .
21) Check spelling
In Chrome you can activate the spelling checker of Chrome in Italian, English and other languages.
READ ALSO: Cheats and main functions for Chrome on Android and iPhone / iPad
