I use two browsers; Chrome and the underrated Opera Browser. One of the more irritating aspects of using Opera is the fact that the Opera web store has an extremely weak selection of extensions. It borders on unacceptable but this doesn’t move me away from Opera entirely as they have other cool features that I’m sticking around for, such as that sidebar and the Instant Search which overlays a search bar on top of your current web page without actually replacing the page entirely.
Given that extensions are a big part of my browsing experience, imagine the joy I had when I found out that the Opera browser actually installs and supports extensions from the Chrome Web Store. So how do you install the extensions?
- Go to the Google Chrome Web Store;
- Search for the extension you need;
- Hit the ‘Add to Opera’ button;
- Wait for the extension to appear in your extensions page (which you are redirected to after step 3) and click ‘Install’
Walk in the park? It’s not all roses, however…
You can’t install themes
If your primary use of the Chrome Web Store is for theming the browser then there’s nothing for you here. You can’t install Google Chrome themes in your Opera Browser and trying to do so will only result in an error message.
Does this work on other browsers?
Everyone says the job of Microsoft’s Edge browser is to download the Google Chrome installer so I headed to the Chrome Web Store using the Edge browser without much hope. Whatever flicker of hope I had was extinguished when I reached the web store and I got a prompt telling me that the extensions were “Available on Chrome.”
What about Firefox? Well,I had to wait for a few seconds since I actually had to install the browser but ultimately I ran into the same fate I had run into on Edge. On Firefox, however, the blow is not as severe as there are many extensions on their web store compared to Microsoft’s.
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Perhaps you can tell us what extensions you find useful?
I use;
The Great Suspender (suspends tabs after a while to ensure unopen tabs are not chowing through your RAM)
LastPass for saving my passwords across all services. Never have to remember a password! Well apart from the master password to Last Pass itself that is.
Ghostery allows me to see which websites are tracking my activity across the internet and occasionally allows me to turn off ads, though I rarely do that for obvious reasons.
Pushbullet allows me to send images, links and other files to and from my phone without needing to connect via USB.
Ecosia is a great search engine that I occasionally use and the proceeds from the search engine are used to plant trees in areas affected by deforestation around the world.