A lightweight, high-performance Manifest V3 Chrome Extension for permanently hiding unwanted HTML elements. Remove distracting sidebars, ads, headers, or overlays with a single click to create a cleaner browsing experience.
- Manifest V3 — Modern extension architecture
- Vanilla JavaScript — Lightweight, zero-dependency logic
- Chrome Scripting API — Dynamic content script injection
- Shadow DOM — Strong UI layout and style isolation
- Chrome Storage API — Local and session-based configuration storage
- Single-Click Hiding: Simply launch the visual selector, hover over any element, and click it directly to remove it instantly (or use the floating tooltip for parent/child navigation).
- Deep DOM Navigation: The selector tooltip provides "Parent" and "Back" controls to easily select outer wrapping containers, equipped with a short 500 ms selection delay to prevent accidental clicks.
- Smart Group Hiding: Automatically detects repeating class structures. For example, hiding one sponsored post can automatically offer to hide all similar sponsored cards on the page.
- Persistent Rules: Hiding rules are automatically re-applied every time you revisit the website.
- Rule Diagnostics: The dashboard displays a status badge next to each rule to diagnose page state:
- Active (green): The target element is found and hidden on the current page.
- Broken (red): The element was created on this path but is no longer found (likely removed by the site or layout changed).
- Inactive (gray): The element is not found on this page, as it was created on a different URL under the same domain.
- Page Unfreezing & Backdrop Cleanup: Resolves frozen scrollbars (
overflow: hidden) and deletes empty overlay backdrops left behind by hidden modals.
- Glassmorphic In-Page Dashboard: Manage, view, and restore your configuration rules from a sleek, dark-themed in-page sidebar.
- Passive Auto-Open UX: Automatically launches the sidebar in a minimized (collapsed) tab state on pages where rules are active, remaining completely hidden on other websites.
- Theme Auto-Adaptation: The interface dynamically adjusts between light and dark modes to blend seamlessly with the website you are visiting.
- Dynamic Badge Counter: The extension toolbar icon displays a real-time badge showing the number of hidden elements on the active tab (in indigo) or "ON" (in green) if active but zero rules exist.
- Privacy-First Onboarding: Offers a clean consent modal with three options: Global access (all sites), Site-Specific access, or Temporary activeTab-based session access.
- Dynamic Content Script Registration: Follows Chrome's least-privilege security model to inject scripts only when rules are configured or the sidebar is open, avoiding unnecessary extension execution on websites without configured rules.
- In-Memory Caching: Synchronous caching avoids repeated storage lookups during DOM processing.
- Layout Thrashing Prevention: Restricts backdrop scanning to relevant top-level candidates, minimizing layout overhead during DOM updates.
- Shadow DOM Style Isolation: Scopes the extension's dashboard CSS strictly inside a closed Shadow Root, preventing website styles from breaking the dashboard.
- Concurrency Locking: Serializes concurrent scripting requests in the service worker to eliminate race conditions.
- Self-Healing Session Cleanup: Automatically purges tab-specific session states upon tab closure, preventing memory and storage leaks.
You can install KD Web Element Hider directly from the Chrome Web Store: 👉 Get KD Web Element Hider on Chrome Web Store
Alternatively, you can open the Chrome Web Store and search for "KD Web Element Hider" to install it with one click.
Note: Chrome Developer Mode is required to load unpacked extensions locally.
To run the extension locally from source:
- Clone this repository:
git clone https://github.com/KhvichaDev/KD-Web-Element-Hider.git
- Open Google Chrome and navigate to
chrome://extensions/. - Enable Developer mode using the toggle switch in the top-right corner.
- Click Load unpacked in the top-left corner.
- Select the project directory containing the
manifest.jsonfile. - Click the extension icon in your toolbar to activate the dashboard on any webpage!
Licensed under the MIT License. See the LICENSE file for details.