Ubuntu Tips n Tricks

10 Chrome Extensions to Enhance your YouTube Experience

Posted: 26 May 2011 10:11 PM PDT

Don't get tired of watching angry hamsters with light-sabers? Or cats jamming on a piano? Then, it's a good time to admit that you're a YouTube addict. Don't worry though, you'll find plenty of other people suffering from this problem (including me…shhh!). So, to feed your hypnotized mind, here's a list of some cool Google Chrome extensions that will take your YouTube addiction to the next level.

1. Turn off the lights

We've already talked about all the cool YouTube movies. And, if you're already heading out to grab that huge bowl of popcorn, then wait up and take a look at this plug-in first. Turn off the Lights is a Google Chrome extension that does exactly what it says – it turns off the lights when you're watching a YouTube video. This means, you won't be seeing any of those flashy adverts that surround a video. Furthermore, the extension comes with a lot of options which you can configure. Say for example, you want to change the opacity; then, you can do that easily by going to the extension's option page. You can also configure which parts of the video page get dimmed. The coolest option however, is the one that dims the lights automatically once the video starts. Grab the extension HERE.

2. Ad block

If you don't like dimming the lights and still want a way out of those ugly adverts, then Ad block is the plug-in for you. Ad block is an extension that blocks all kinds of adverts; including the text ones, thus making browsing clean and less distractive. The hugely popular extension is available for other browsers as well. For now, the link for the Chrome one can be found HERE.

3. Auto Replay

There are lots of nice videos on YouTube. Some of them deserve to be bookmarked and watched more than once. And, some others deserve to be played again and again endlessly till you get tired of watching them. For such videos, Auto Replay is a great extension. All it does is, it replays the video once it ends. What's more, the extension also comes with an option to place a delay before the video starts playing again. Download it HERE.

4. Window Expander

This is another great extension that promises a distraction-free YouTube experience. Window Expander when enabled fills the entire window with the video thus eliminating all the distractions from the page. This is different from full screen viewing, as it doesn't take up the whole screen. You can grab the extension HERE.

5. Magic Actions

This is one of the best extensions when it comes to ameliorating the overall YouTube experience. Magic Actions comes with most of the aforementioned features plus a few more, thus making it a complete package. According to the site here's what it does:

"The Magic Actions for YouTube™ will help you to change speaker volume by scrolling mouse wheel, watch videos at highest possible quality using AutoHD feature, 1-click Cinema Mode, expand videos to Full window size, manage whether or not the initial video will auto play when the player loads, replay a video again and again, and more!"

The extension might be a bit heavy for folks who don't want all the features. In that case, users can try out any of the extensions mentioned before. Nevertheless, you can get the original extension HERE.

6. Lyrics

This one is especially for users who watch a lot of music videos on YouTube. When installed, it places a small button besides Chrome's address bar. Now, whenever you're watching a music video on YouTube, the extension finds lyrics for the video and when it's done it changes the button's icon indicating that it has found the lyrics. All you have to do is click on the button to view the video's lyrics. You may download the extension HERE.

7. Scrobble to last.fm

This is another great extension for music junkies scrounging for their favorite songs on YouTube. Scrobble to last.fm simply scrobbles the song data of the music video you're watching to your last.fm profile. Note that, it only scrobbles a music video if its title is in an Artist-Track format. You can get the Last.fm Scrobbler extension HERE.

8. Remove comments

Tired of those trolling comments while you enjoy Rebecca Black belting out that chart-topping Friday number? Same here, that's why I use the Remove comments extension for Chrome. It's certified Troll-free and works for almost any video! Download it HERE.

9. YouTube Thumbs

This nifty little extension makes up for a feature that YouTube has been missing for so long. Whenever you hover over a video on say Dailymotion, you get a thumbnail preview of the contents of the video. YouTube thumbs adds the same functionality to our good old YouTube. A perfect tool to avoid getting Rickrolled again. Get YouTube Thumbs HERE.

10. Easy YouTube Video Downloader

This is an unofficial extension but it still deserves a worthy mention on this list. Easy YouTube Video Downloader allows downloading any YouTube video by placing a small 'Download' button at the bottom of the video. Videos can then be downloaded in various formats like 360P flv, 480P flv, HD mp4 and even MP3. Get Easy YouTube Video Downloader HERE.

P.S: Please note that downloading videos from YouTube is against their policy and might also be illegal.