Most Chrome extension recommendation lists are written by people who installed everything for two days and never measured the impact on browser speed. We have rotated through hundreds of extensions over five years. The nine below survived. Each one solves a specific problem and stays out of the way until you need it.
1. uBlock Origin — block ads and trackers
Still the gold standard for browser ad blocking. Lower memory usage than every alternative we have tested, blocks the vast majority of trackers, and never sells your data. Free, open source, no premium tier. The only correct way to install: from the Chrome Web Store, by the author "Raymond Hill (gorhill)" — multiple copycats exist.
2. Bitwarden — password manager
For people not deep in the Apple ecosystem, Bitwarden is the free password manager to use. Cross-platform, end-to-end encrypted, open source. Once installed, you stop typing passwords forever and your friend Aslam stops asking you why his account got hacked.
3. Tab Suspender — actually free this time
Chrome's built-in Memory Saver works but is conservative. Tab Suspender (the open-source one, not the paid clones) lets you set a tab to auto-suspend after, say, 30 minutes of inactivity. Crucial if you have a "research tab graveyard" of 80 open tabs and a 4 GB RAM laptop.
4. Web Archives — instantly check archived versions
Click the icon on any page → instantly see the Wayback Machine, Google Cache, and Archive.today versions of that URL. Indispensable when an article disappears mid-research, or when you want to see what a competitor's site looked like six months ago.
5. SponsorBlock — skip sponsored segments in YouTube
YouTube's own sponsorships are not blocked by ad blockers, because they are baked into the video. SponsorBlock uses crowdsourced timestamps to auto-skip the "today's video is sponsored by NordVPN" segment. Saves maybe twenty minutes a week if you watch a lot of YouTube.
6. Save to Notion / Save to Obsidian
If you keep notes in Notion or Obsidian, the official "web clipper" extensions save any page (or selection) directly into a chosen folder with one click. Stops the death loop of bookmarking 200 articles and never reading any.
7. ColorZilla — pick any colour from any webpage
Useful for designers, developers, and anyone who has ever said "what shade of blue is this exactly?" Click the eyedropper, hover, get the hex code, RGB, HSL. Also includes a CSS gradient generator.
8. JSON Viewer — make raw JSON readable
Developers only. When an API returns JSON in the browser, this extension auto-formats it with collapsible sections, syntax highlighting, and search. Replaces the standard wall of unreadable text on every API endpoint.
9. Dark Reader — dark mode for every website
Forces a dark theme on every site, even ones that do not natively support it. The auto-generated palettes are surprisingly good — the few problematic sites can be excluded with one click. If you read a lot at night, your eyes will thank you within a week.
The rule for extensions
Every extension you install adds permissions, memory usage, and a tiny attack surface. The right number is "as few as possible." When in doubt, do not install it. Twice a year, open chrome://extensions and remove anything you have not consciously used in the past three months. The difference in browser speed is often immediate.