Get to know Google Workspace

9 Chrome extensions that supercharge Google Drive

Add together these extensions for Chrome to work faster and smarter with Google Drive and Google's productivity apps, Docs, Sheets, and Slides.

Google Bulldoze is a powerful concern tool in its ain correct, specially when partnered with Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides. Just a number of Chrome browser extensions tin add more file management features and other tricks to Google's deject storage and office apps.

If you regularly use Google Drive through Chrome or Chrome Bone, consider adding the following extensions to make working with Drive and Google's productivity apps more efficient and productive.

1. AwesomeDrive for Google Bulldoze

If y'all use Microsoft Office and store your Office documents in Google Drive, AwesomeDrive is a must. In one case the extension is installed in Chrome, you can open an Office certificate from Google Drive and it will load in the Microsoft Office application (Excel, PowerPoint, Word) that'due south installed on your computer.

Afterward you edit and save the document in Office, the new version of it volition be saved dorsum to Google Bulldoze. Thus, AwesomeDrive saves y'all from having to manually download your Office documents from Google Drive and upload them once again afterward yous've worked on them in Microsoft Office.

ii. Checker Plus for Google Drive / 3. Drive Anywhere

Checker Plus lets you access Google Drive and manage your files without needing to open your Google Drive dwelling house screen in a Chrome tab. Clicking the Checker Plus icon on the Chrome toolbar opens a panel that shows your files in your Google Drive. Here you tin browse or search for files, as well as delete or rename them.

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With Checker Plus, you can open and manage files stored in Google Bulldoze without launching Drive in a new browser tab. (Click image to enlarge it.)

When you click a filename, the certificate volition open in the advisable Google office app inside a new browser tab. Y'all can besides copy shareable web links to files, star items so they're easy to keep track of, and upload files from your reckoner to Google Drive.

In addition, Checker Plus can alert y'all whenever a file in your Google Drive has been changed (such as a document that you've shared with someone to edit). These alerts are sent as notification cards that pop up from the lower-right corner of your reckoner's desktop and from the Checker Plus icon on the Chrome toolbar.

Drive Anywhere is similar to Checker Plus, but with fewer functions to manage your files. Then why would you consider using it? Drive Anywhere lets you download your files through its toolbar console, something you tin't exercise through Checker Plus.

4. OmniDrive

While Checker Plus and Drive Anywhere provide a quick way to notice files in Google Drive without having to commencement open up your Drive home screen, OmniDrive makes it fifty-fifty faster by calculation the power to search your Drive files right from the Chrome address bar (the "Omnibox" in Google lingo).

You type the give-and-take drive into the address bar, followed past a infinite. Equally soon every bit you type that infinite, "OmniDrive" appears at the outset of the accost bar. Now type in the filename or a give-and-take or phrase in the certificate that yous want to observe in Google Bulldoze and hit Enter. Your Google Bulldoze page opens in the browser window and shows the search results.

A caveat: This extension hasn't been updated in several years, but information technology still works, and its code is available publicly as open source.

v. Google Docs Quick Create

This extension lets y'all apace get-go a new Google Drive document, spreadsheet, presentation, drawing, or form. Click the Google Docs Quick Create icon on the Chrome toolbar, and a panel opens showing icon shortcuts. Click one to launch the corresponding Google Drive office app (Google Docs, Sheets, Slides, etc.) inside a new browser tab.

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Creating a new certificate, spreadsheet, presentation, cartoon, or form at any fourth dimension takes but two clicks with the Google Docs Quick Create extension.

vi. Open up with Google Drive Viewer

This extension can be convenient for viewing documents and other files that are on the web without having to download them starting time. By right-clicking the web link to the certificate and picking Open with Google Drive Viewer from the pane that opens, the extension will load the linked document in the appropriate Google office app. (Y'all may need to reload the browser tab to get the document to appear, particularly if it's a .ppt file.)

Supported files include the Microsoft Office formats (.physician/.docx, .ppt/.pptx, .xls/.xlsx) likewise as .txt and .zilch files, PDFs, and more.

7. Office Editing for Docs, Sheets & Slides

Google's Office Editing for Docs, Sheets & Slides extension is useful if you piece of work with Microsoft Office documents frequently but prefer to utilise Google's Docs, Sheets, and Slides apps.

When you elevate and drop a Word, Excel, or PowerPoint file that's stored on your computer onto a Chrome browser window, it volition automatically load in the appropriate Google part app for you to view and edit — then a .doc/.docx file volition open up in Google Docs, .xls/.xlsx in Google Sheets, and .ppt/.pptx in Google Slides.

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Simply drag and drop Office-formatted files onto Chrome, and they'll open for editing in Docs, Sheets, or Slides. (Click image to enlarge it.)

You tin likewise open up a Microsoft Office certificate within the appropriate Google office app past pressing Ctrl-O while in Chrome and selecting the document on your reckoner.

True, for the by couple of years Docs, Sheets, and Slides have been able to edit Function-formatted files natively, simply only if you upload them to Google Drive first. This extension lets you open an Role-formatted file on your calculator directly from Chrome.

Note: In Chrome OS, this extension is installed by default.

8. Save Emails to Google Bulldoze

CloudHQ'southward Save Emails to Google Drive extension works with your Gmail and Google Drive accounts together. It converts an email in your Gmail business relationship to PDF format and stores it in your Google Drive. This can be useful if you accept business concern or legal correspondence that should be archived as PDFs for easy printing or sharing with others.

To do this, open an email bulletin in Gmail. Click the "Salve to" button on the toolbar above your email and choose "Salvage to Google Drive" from the driblet-down pane. You'll be shown a window listing the folders in your Google Drive; select the one where you desire to relieve the PDF of the message, along with any file attachments information technology has.

This extension also works from the abode screen of your Gmail user business relationship. Select one or more emails from here and click the "Download as PDF" icon on the toolbar higher up the electronic mail bailiwick headings. A drop-down pane volition permit y'all save all the emails you selected every bit separate PDFs, merge them together into ane PDF, or save only the attachments to these emails. The PDFs created, and any attachments in these emails, volition be saved to a folder that you choose in Google Drive.

CloudHQ uses its ain server to pull off this fob. (See the visitor'south security and privacy policies.) You tin convert and save upwards to 50 of your Gmail letters per month for costless. You'll need to pay for a Premium plan at $xv per calendar month to convert and save an unlimited number of emails.

9. Save to Google Drive

Here'south another useful Chrome extension from the Google Drive developers. With Save to Google Drive, you can stow items that you come across in your web browsing, such as documents, images, and media, directly in Google Drive without having to download them first. For example, if you want to salvage an image you encounter in the browser window, right-click it and so click Save Paradigm to Google Drive from the pane that opens.

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Relieve to Google Drive lets you lot save documents, images, media, and web pages to your Google Drive with a couple of clicks.

Salve to Google Bulldoze as well adds its icon to the Chrome toolbar; when clicked, information technology volition screen-capture the web page in the currently active browser tab and upload this image to your Google Drive. It tin can be set to practice this in ane of v means: as a screen grab of the page'due south whole layout, as a screen catch of the section of the page that'south visible in the browser window, as the page's HTML source file, as an MHT spider web archive file, or equally a document that y'all tin can edit in Google Docs.

This article was originally published in January 2018 and updated in May 2021.

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