As a designer, one is always looking for useful ways to enhance and make the work more productive. This addition allows us to improve our process and end solution. In this article, we are sharing some useful Google Chrome extensions – which can effectively be utilized by designers. Why Google Chrome? Google Chrome has a huge usage share among all web browsers. Such massive usage contributes to a lot of development on top of browsers such as extensions and themes (available in the Chrome Web Store). Here is a list of some best – must-have Google Chrome extensions for designers.
goCast screen recording
As a designer, you will need some kind of quick screen recording option. This would be good in raising bugs to the development team about a visual issue or recording some demo etc. goCast is completely free Chrome extension. It allows users to capture video directly from the tab. Other options include capturing desktop video, whole or a specific window and capturing webcam only. You will definitely want to keep the recordings short in order to use fewer resources to render the videos.
Window Resizer
Resizing the window and trying out different resolutions becomes a consistent and never-ending task. Window Resizer extension can make the whole resolution driving process smoother. It allows you to resize the browser window to emulate various screen resolutions (i.e. iPhone 11 screen, and a Pixel 4 screen). Easily test your layouts by using different browser resolutions directly from the tab. You can define your own list as its fully customizable. Easy to say, Window Resizer is a must-have chrome extension for all designers and developers.
Vidyard
Vidyard is another screen recording extension that is quite popular on Chrome. You can record and share videos using the extension. Vidyard allows on-screen drawing while recording or addition of speaking notes. You can publish the video on the platform, share and get some stats about who watched the video.
Fonts Ninja
As a part of discovery work – a designer might need to identify fonts. Fonts Ninja – allows users to quickly identify fonts from any website, try them and even purchase them. After enabling the extension, you can hover over an item and see details about the font. Information such as font variation, availability and price are also available in detail. You can bookmark fonts, and manage them right from the extension. This is another must-have Chrome extension for designers.
svg-grabber
This Chrome extension allows you to quickly preview and download SVG assets from the website. It’s an open-source tool and is free. A designer might hit instances where he/she might want to grab something from a website (logo, icon, graphic etc). This extension would be good to have if in such need.
CSS Peeper
CSS Peeper allows users to extract CSS and build beautiful style guides to consume. It gets nasty when things keep changing in an iterative manner and design guides are not updated. Digging into code becomes a tricky exercise. CSS Peeper Chrome extension is a CSS viewer tailored for designers. You can easily find out the line height or font on the web page using this extension. Saves a lot of time!.
Page Ruler Redux
Being a designer, it needs a lot of effort to get pixel-perfect dimensions and positioning. Add Page Ruler Redux to your extension list. It allows you to get those pixel-perfect measurements of any web element. You can easily resize the ruler by dragging by mouse or using arrow keys. This extension is free and a must-have for designers and developers alike.
ColorZilla
ColorZilla is another must-have Chrome extension for designers. It has millions of users and is an advanced eyedropper, color picker and gradient generator. You can get a color assessment from any point in your browser. The extension has neat features such as a CSS gradient generator, web page color analyzer, and picking colors at any zoom level.
Lorem Ipsum Generator
We need dummy text and Lorem Ipsum comes to the rescue. There are tons of free online generators but a Chrome extension is good to have. You can quickly create default dummy text by configuring a number of paragraphs to be generated. This is a must-have for designers and developers alike.
Design Hunt
Give yourself that quick dose of viewing some refreshing collections of new products and inspirations with Design Hunt. This extension works in a way that once you open a new tab, a feed of current top curated inspiration pieces from Design Hunt will be present.
Muzli 2
Muzil 2 is similar in nature to Design Hunt and works the same way as well. It’s just a different source that presents you with those daily inspirations and creative ideas.
Screenshot Easy
Last but not least, one of our recommended ones – Is screenshot easy. You can take screenshots in the easiest possible way. It is a very simple extension and allows full-page screenshots or visible parts of the screen. You can edit screenshots, copy them to a clipboard or download them.
Thank you for going through our recommended list, and do leave a comment if we have missed out on one that you use. Enjoy!.
Leave a Reply