If you’re reading online articles, there are some useful extensions for Chrome that can improve your experience.

People these days use their web browsers for more things than anything else. These Chrome extensions help you get the most out of browsing the web.

It’s no secret that Google Chrome is one of the most popular browsers out there. What sets it apart from its competitors is the vibrant community of extension makers who create new features for it. They include things like reading mode, which remembers where you scrolled, so you don’t lose track of where you left off.

Here are some of the useful Chrome extensions to improve your reading experience.

1. Fika

Fika-Chrome-Extension

Fika offers a little bit more than just the default options for Chrome. It strips out clutter from an article and presents it in a clean and easy-to-read format.

Inspired by Amazon’s Kindle, Fika makes it easy to navigate through longer articles by creating an interactive TOC (Table of Contents). It allows you to click on any section to jump directly there, and it’s a nice sidebar while reading long-form content.

You can even change the background and text colors for the reader pane.

You can choose from six different font styles when using Fika Mode, including small, medium, large, bold, italicized, and underlined. There’s also an easy-to-use keyboard shortcut (Alt + Shift + R) for invoking Fika. It’s surprisingly quick.

Download: Fika Chrome Extension (Free)

2. Omoguru

Omoguru-Chrome-Extension

Omoguru will alter how text appears on any webpage, customized to how you’d like it. You can select from 7 font styles, including both Sans and Serif, set how much to zoom the text on a page, set a custom color for all pages, and decide how much spacing should exist between lines.

Like many others, Omoguru offers an option called “Reader Mode” for any page that has an article. To turn it on, you simply click on the icon in the toolbar. It’s optimized for news sites, but it also works well for email clients, like Gmail and Facebook, and even web applications, like Google Docs and Microsoft Office.

Download: Omoguru Chrome Extension (Free)

3. Fready

Fready-Chrome-Extension

Fready aims to recreate the experience of reading an article by highlighting words as you go through them. Instead of a finger on a page, Fready highlights words as you scroll down a web page.

It also offers an interesting feature: it slows down on difficult, long, rare, or scientific words, so you don’t get distracted by them. Plus, it’s completely mouse-free, automatically scrolling down when it reaches the bottom of the screen without having to click anything.

You can customize the speed of reading by choosing from four different options in Fready’s settings. By default, it reads at a rate of 250 words per minute, which is the global average. However, you can adjust that to whichever setting works best for you.

Download: Fready Chrome Extension (Free)

4. Bionize

Bionize-Chrome-Extension

Bionize is an extension that uses the concept of bionic reading to make reading articles online easier. In layman’s terms, bionic reading analyzes the article and turns certain sections of the text into bolded text. The claim is this helps you read the article faster. Studies show that our brains can read much faster than our eyes allow, so sometimes we find it difficult to find the start of new words or sentences. Bionize claims there is no proof that bionic reading works, but it’s worth giving it a try.

With Bionize, you simply click the icon in the extensions’ toolbar to turn it on and off. It doesn’t try to provide a minimalist reading experience or change the font or the size of the text. You just get to see the original webpage with highlighted words.

Download: Bionize Chrome Extension (Free)

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5. Scrroll In

Scrroll-In-Chrome-Extension

You may want to bookmark articles online, so you can return to them later. If you close your browser window, Scrroll In remembers where you left off when you reopen the page.

With Scrroll In, you don’t need to manually go back to the previous page to check if there were any updates. Instead, you can use the built-in feature to instantly see whether there was an updated version available. You can even view all your saved scroll point data in one place.

Unfortunately, Scroll In doesn’t provide any built-in keyboard shortcuts, so you’d need to use an extension for that. Fortunately, you can set custom keybindings in Chrome extensions to save/fetch a scroll point or jump to the top/bottom of the page.

Download: Scroll In Chrome Extension (Free)

6. Website Read Progress

Website-Read-Progress-Chrome-Extension

If you’re reading an article and want to know how much longer there is left, then check out Website Read Progress. It shows you how far you’ve gone through the text and how much remains.

You can either display it as a horizontal line at the top of the webpage or a floating circle that fills up with purple. You can also decide if clicking the bar returns you to the homepage, goes back to the previous page, closes the browser tab, etc.

Download: Website Read Progress Chrome Extension (Free)

7. SpeedReader

SpeedReader-Chrome-Extension

If you’re looking for ways to improve your reading speed, we’ve already covered some of the best speed reading extensions for Google Chrome. But SpeedReader takes things one step further by using Tim Ferris’ speed reading technique where you focus on your peripheral vision.

Speed Reader adds two red lines as page margins, cutting off the beginning of the first paragraph and the ending of the last paragraph. The idea is to start reading at the top of the screen and end at the bottom. You can try it out by installing this extension.

Download: SpeedReader Chrome Extension (Free)

8. Reeader

Reeader-Chrome-Extension

Reader is a unique way to read articles online with a Chrome browser extension. It works by turning articles into a simplified version of themselves where words are highlighted, sentences are bolded, and paragraphs are underlined. The difference is that it also includes some additional features that help you read it faster.

Download: Reeader Chrome Extension (Free)

9. ReadBee

Readbee-Chrome-Extension

ReadBee provides all the tools you need to customize your reading experience online. You could change the size of the font, adjust the line spacing, and make the font bigger if you prefer a more comfortable reading experience.

You can choose from three different backgrounds: White, Beige, and Black. This also means it’s the perfect addition for people who use their computer at night because they can adjust its color scheme to suit their needs.

Download: ReadBee Chrome Extension (Free)


Did we miss anything? If you know other Chrome Extensions that can improve your reading experience online, let us know in the comments section.

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