RFD Top 10: Browser Extensions to Enhance Your Online Shopping Prowess
By Simon Hung
September 17, 2015Browser extensions are pretty remarkable. Like adding aftermarket parts to a car, adding an extension to your browser can improve your productivity and tweak its functions to perfectly suit your needs. There are extensions for just about everything – from useful tools like the Reddit Enhancement Suite to zany themes that change your browser’s appearance.
In this top 10, we’re showing you ten useful extensions that you can add to your Firefox or Chrome browser (sorry Internet Explorer users) to help you become a more productive online shopper.
10. Currency Converter (Firefox, Chrome)
With the Canadian dollar at an 11-year low, sometimes it’s nice to see how many dollars you’ll actually be spending when shopping on American or international stores. While the functionality is built into Google search, this lightweight extension lets you quickly compare currencies without having to leave your page.
9. Pocket (Built into Firefox, Chrome)
There’s probably been more than a few times when you’ve shopped online or perused RFD while at work or school. There’s no need to feel bad – we do it too. Pocket is a handy extension that saves any webpage, photo or video link to the cloud, allowing you to easily pick up your procrastination right where you left off, at home or on the go. There’s also apps available for iOS and Android for easy access to anything you save on mobile platforms.
8. Adblock Plus (Firefox, Chrome)
Adblock is great. Among other things, it allows you to skip annoying YouTube ads and block pesky pop-ups – when was the last time you were the millionth visitor to a site? But, disabling it on your favourite retailers might be a smart choice. In some cases, Adblock can actually block content that you want to see. In our research, we found that the extension blocked a promo code banner on The Bay and even blocked the entire flyer on Toys R Us. So while it is a must-have for any browser, play around with it on some of your favourite shopping sites to see what you may be missing.
7. Panic Button (Firefox, Chrome)
Let’s say you’re doing some gift shopping for a relative and they suddenly walk into the room. You could awkwardly fumble around trying to close your browser windows, or you could download this extension. Panic Button allows you to quickly hide your browser tabs, keeping your shopping a secret to whoever your unexpected visitor may be – whether it’s a relative, loved one, or nosy boss.
Passwords are a pain. Even if your password for everything is omgilovetaylorswift, it’s annoying having to type it out every time you need to log into a site. LastPass helps to streamline your shopping process by securely managing your passwords, addresses and credit card information, then automatically filling it whenever you reach the checkout stage, allowing you to save precious seconds buying your stuff – a very handy feature once limited-stock deals become plentiful during the holiday season.
5. "Add to Wish List" Button (Firefox, Chrome)
Amazon is like a lot like Red from The Shawshank Redemption – you know, ‘that guy’ who happens to know how to get anything. In fact, that’s why we love it so much. This extension is perfect for coming up with gift lists – it allows you to add just about anything from any site into an Amazon wish list. From there, you have access to that list on your Amazon account and can view its listing at any time, even if it’s not available on Amazon.
4. Tab Scope (Firefox) and TooManyTabs (Chrome)
We’ve all been there – those awkward times when you have too many tabs open and have no idea which tab is what and what tab is which. Tab Scope allows you to see a preview of your tab’s content by hovering over a tab on your tab bar – super handy when you’re shopping and have a lot of product pages open. TooManyTabs for Chrome is similar, although instead of a hover preview, you get an overlay pane with a preview of all of your tabs in one view.
3. Enhanced Steam (Firefox, Chrome)
A useful tool for Steam users (especially during Steam sales), Enhanced Steam allows you to quickly view a wide range of nifty information when browsing the Steam store on Firefox or Chrome. This includes highlighting games and DLC you own or have on a wish list, pointing out third-party DRM on games, viewing a price history for games, and perhaps most demoralizing – viewing how much money you’ve spent on Steam.
Here’s a dilemma many of you have probably endured: you’re ready to complete your order, but like a true RFDer, you want to save even more. So you meticulously search for coupon codes, only to frustratingly realize that none of them work. Honey eliminates that frustration by automatically searching and entering any available coupons for whatever site you’re on.
1. The Camelizer (Firefox, Chrome)
Not only does this extension win for having the coolest name, but it’s extremely valuable when shopping on Amazon. CamelCamelCamel is one of our favourite sites – it analyzes and graphs the pricing history of almost any Amazon product. Without leaving your webpage, this extension allows you view a price history with a single click, letting you become the ultimate Amazon power-shopper.
That's it! Now that you know about these extensions, you can be an even more efficient online shopper! Be sure to let us know if you installed any of our suggestions. Better yet, tell us in the comments if you use any other extensions that we may have missed. And as always, be sure to share this with anyone you think would benefit!
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