Hotkeys can be an essential part of a user’s productivity. When all the actions you want to perform are mapped to key combinations, opening windows, executing tasks, and searching for what you need becomes much faster. Google Chrome extensions have always been a great source for boosting your productivity. If the extension supports it, you can even set up custom hotkeys to quickly access the extension’s features.
Content
- Create Keyboard Shortcuts for Google Chrome Extensions
- Creating Custom Global Hotkeys for Chrome
- Considerations When Setting Chrome Extension Hotkeys
- What if I Can’t Set Hotkeys for a Chrome Extension?
Create Keyboard Shortcuts for Google Chrome Extensions
One of the best parts of setting up the hotkeys in Chrome is that you don’t have to go through the settings of each individual extension to do so. Instead, we’re going to be using Google Chrome extension hotkey list. This allows us to browse every single action we can assign hotkeys to via extensions, as well as creating said hotkeys.
To start, click the three dots at the top right of the Chrome window. In the drop-down that appears, select Extensions -> Manage Extensions.
Doing this will bring up the Extensions page where you can edit, turn off, and manage the extensions. Click the menu icon on the page’s upper left corner, then select Keyboard Shortcuts.
This will load the page that lists all the Chrome extensions on your system that can support hotkeys. Scroll through the list and find the extension you would like to set up a shortcut for. In my case, I want to create a keyboard shortcut for the Google Translate extension.
To create a hotkey, click the Pencil icon beside the box that says “Not set” on your function, then press the keys you want to assign. For me, I will set my Google Translate toggle to Ctrl + Shift + R.
Note: Chrome requires you to use either the Ctrl or Alt keys as your keybind modifier key. This means that you can’t create keybinds such as: Ctrl + Alt + X and Ctrl + Alt + Shift + X.
Confirm that your new hotkey is properly working by closing the keybinds tab and pressing your hotkey.
Creating Custom Global Hotkeys for Chrome
A neat feature of Chrome is that it can set hotkeys that will trigger even outside the browser window. While it’s not available for all extensions, it’s highly convenient whenever it’s available for your specific extension. For example, you can be in a different application altogether and still be able to activate your extension.
To set a global hotkey, go to your Extensions page, then select Keyboard Shortcuts on the page’s left sidebar.
Click the Pencil icon, then provide the hotkey for the function that you want. If that function supports global hotkeys, the In Chrome dropdown box beside it will turn active. In my case, the Bitwarden Password Manager extension provides a global option for its “lock” function.
Click the dropdown box, then change the value of your function from “In Chrome” to “Global.”
Minimize your Chrome window, then test whether your custom hotkey works by pressing it while on your desktop.
Note: Global hotkeys won’t work if Chrome is not currently running on your system. You can solve this by minimizing your browser instead of closing it.
Considerations When Setting Chrome Extension Hotkeys
Creating your first custom hotkey for your Chrome extensions can be daunting, especially if you haven’t done it before. In this section, we will look at some tips to apply to your setup that can make assigning keybinds a little more manageable.
Avoid Overriding Default Chrome Functions
The biggest issue with creating custom hotkeys in Chrome is that it’s possible to override the default shortcuts of your browser. To add to that, Chrome also doesn’t warn you of any conflicts that your new keybind will make.
One way to solve this issue is to look up the keyboard shortcuts for Chrome and make sure that your new hotkey doesn’t conflict with any existing shortcut. For instance, you should avoid assigning your extensions to the Ctrl + T hotkey since this will disable your ability to quickly create new tabs.
Note: This tip also applies to Global hotkeys since doing so will automatically disable any keyboard shortcuts on your system in place of your new Chrome shortcut.
Create Easy to Remember Hotkeys
One of the easiest ways to maintain a hotkey scheme is to have an easy to remember mnemonics for your shortcuts. This allows you to quickly recall any function without forcing yourself to memorize a lot of keyboard combinations.
Personally, I find that setting my shortcut key to one of the letters in the extension’s function helps a lot when creating a mnemonic. For example, I usually set Google Translate to Ctrl + Shift + R since it avoids any collisions with the default keybinds and also remind me of the letter “R” in “translate.”
Use Modifier Keys to Layer Multiple Functions
Another trick that you can do with your custom hotkeys is to assign your extensions across different modifier keys. This allows you to create a distinct “layer” for each of your extensions, which makes organizing and remembering them easier.
In my setup, I allocate the Ctrl + Shift modifiers for simple extensions while I use the Alt + Shift modifiers for extensions that have more than one hotkey. For instance, my Google Translate toggle sits at Ctrl + Shift + R while my Bitwarden lock hotkey uses Alt + Shift + X.
It’s also possible to omit the Shift modifier key, which can give you more options for keyboard combinations. However, doing this requires you to be more mindful of the default keybinds since there’s a higher chance that you will overwrite a hotkey.
Cluster Your Custom Hotkeys Together
A key benefit of using hotkeys is the ability to quickly access any function without going through a program’s GUI prompts. As such, it’s also important to make sure that you can easily trigger them without disrupting your current workflow.
One of the tricks that I use when assigning hotkeys is making them as close as possible to where my right hand naturally rests in the keyboard. This allows me to use my keybinds without moving my hand too far from where it normally is. For example, both my Google Translate toggle and Bitwarden hotkeys use R and X for its final keys making them very quick to use.
What if I Can’t Set Hotkeys for a Chrome Extension?
If you have extensions that you want to set hotkeys for and it doesn’t appear on the list, there’s a chance the developer hasn’t added Chrome support for it yet. That said, it’s possible that your extension comes with its own keybind system.
Check within the extension’s settings to see if there’s an option for keybinds there. For instance, the Vimium Chrome extension uses its own keybind system where you can define custom hotkeys in its options page.
Lastly, if that option doesn’t exist, try to contact the extension developer and let them know that you’d love keyboard shortcuts for their extension.
Learning how to assign custom hotkeys for your Chrome extensions is just one of the neat things that you can do with this wonderful web browser. Explore how you can integrate AI to your browsing experience with some of the best ChatGPT extensions for Chrome today.
Image credit: Juan Gomez via Unsplash and Wikimedia Commons. All alterations and screenshots by Ramces Red.
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Ramces Red –
Staff Writer
Ramces is a technology writer that lived with computers all his life. A prolific reader and a student of Anthropology, he is an eccentric character that writes articles about Linux and anything *nix.
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