Dev tools · alternatives · 2026
24 alternatives to HN Comments Owl
Highlight new Hacker News comments, and other UX tweaks
Below are 24 products that do a similar job, ranked by how close each is in meaning and then by launch-day votes. HN Comments Owl launched in 2019; newer entries below may have overtaken it.
- 1
Highlight new comments, mute users & tweak UI on Hacker News
2023 · apps.apple.com · its alternatives →
- 2
2021 · chrome.google.com · its alternatives →
- 3HR
2016 · hnreplies.com · its alternatives →
- 4
Little chrome extension I made to collapse comments on HN, feel free to use it if you want.
2014 · github.com · its alternatives →
- 5EH
2016 · comments.network · its alternatives →
- 6
2016 · chrome.google.com · its alternatives →
- 7
Web Extension: Easily find Hacker News discussions about the page you're currently browsing. - pinoceniccola/what-hn-says-webext
2020 · github.com · its alternatives →
- 8
HN is great for the links people share, but a big part of the value I get comes from reading the discussion around them. I realized I was always opening the article in one tab and the comments in another, constantly switching back and forth. I figured there was probably a simpler way, so I threw together this userscript to merge the two. 1. Clicking a link from Hacker News opens the article with a side panel containing the discussion. It doesn't require your credentials, is resizable, and is easy to tweak if you want to customize it. 2. If you land on an article that has previously been…
Jul 2026 · github.com · its alternatives →
- 9HN
2012 · hncomments.nathancahill.com · its alternatives →
- 10
Add a bell emoji to unread comments on HackerNews. GitHub Gist: instantly share code, notes, and snippets.
2021 · gist.github.com · its alternatives →
- 11HA
Hey there HN! I wanted to share a pet project of mine. I built HackYourNews [1] to scratch a personal itch: Knowing which stories to focus on while browsing aimlessly (though there is a certain joy in that, as well!) HackYourNews uses OpenAI's gpt-3.5-turbo to summarize the destination article as well as the comments section. Summarization of the article is always cached, while summaries of the comments are regenerated if the comments count is >10% (or >10 comments) different. While I styled the homepage to welcome HNers, my preferred view is the Mobile view, accessed from the navbar. This…
2023 · hackyournews.com · its alternatives →
- 12
The Hacker News front page, with a short video explainer for every story.
24d ago · hn.watch · its alternatives →
- 13
Hacker News comments sidebar bookmarklet. GitHub Gist: instantly share code, notes, and snippets.
2023 · gist.github.com · its alternatives →
- 14
Chrome extension that injects a button to return to HN
2021 · chromewebstore.google.com · its alternatives →
- 15
Subscribe to HN articles to get comment notifications
2017 · chromewebstore.google.com · its alternatives →
- 16
2010 · chrome.google.com · its alternatives →
- 17
HN Notifier is a chrome extension that shows the number of unread comments to your HackerNews thread. One of the issues with HackerNews is that it is difficult to know when someone has replied to your post or comment, thus by missing an opportunity to continue the conversation. - meanands/hn-notifie
2022 · github.com · its alternatives →
- 18
UserScript: Indicate New/Unread HN stories on front page since your last visit. - Hacker_News_Story_Rank_Change_Indicator.user.js
2024 · gist.github.com · its alternatives →
- 19
I've been working on and off on a Chrome Extension for Hacker News, the extension focusses on improved usability rather than design. I can almost guarantee that after a day you won't want to go back to regular Hacker News. Give it a try, features include: - Improved readability - Quick inline replies from comments page - Quick profiles with social network info when hovering over usernames - Filtering of stories based on terms and phrases / domain or user - Endless scrolling - Collapsible comment threads - Social sharing for Twitter, Facebook, Google+, Buffer Forks, improvements and comments…
2012 · chrome.google.com · its alternatives →
- 20
I have a dedicated HN tab that I come back to and reload multiple times a day to see whats new and hot. I wrote a Chrome Extension to: - quickly scan new articles since my last reload - quickly scan highly discussed articles - open actual articles and discussions in a new tab This links to the source code. The chrome extension is linked at the bottom of the github page. Note: - This extension only operates on the HN front page (https://news.ycombinator.com/news) - The first time you reload the HN front page after installing the extension all articles will get highlighted.
2024 · github.com · its alternatives →
- 21
Since▲96Highlights new posts on HN's frontpage since your last visit
2020 · chromewebstore.google.com · its alternatives →
- 22ST
2020 · hndex.ml · its alternatives →
- 23
Hacker Smacker adds friend/foe functionality to Hacker News. Three little orbs appear next to every commenter's name. Click to friend or foe a commenter and you'll more easily spot them on future threads. Makes it easy to scroll and spot the commenters you love to read (and hate to read). Main website: https://hackersmacker.org Chrome/Edge extension: https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/hacker-smacker/lmcg... Safari extension: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/hacker-smacker/id1480749725 Firefox extension:…
Feb 2026 · hackersmacker.org · its alternatives →
- 24
Hacker News commenting improvement extension for Google Chrome - j-clark/hacked_hacker_news
2013 · github.com · its alternatives →
Also compare
- Comments Owl for Hacker News alternatives
- A Chrome extension to see notifications for comments on your HN threads alternatives
- HN Replies – Get notified of replies to your comments alternatives
- Collapse HN Comments alternatives
- Embed HN comments in your website alternatives
- Collapse Comments on Hacker News alternatives
Ranked by how close each launch is in meaning, then by votes. Prices were read from each product’s own site when checked and can change. Refine with your own description →