February 2026
One underrated internet hack I swear by—and honestly wish more people used—is turning your browser into a personal “instant research assistant” by customizing your search engine shortcuts.
Most people know you can type something into Google and hit enter. Fine. Normal. But what’s wildly underused is the fact that you can basically build your own mini-command system inside your browser so you can search specific websites instantly without even opening them first.
For example, imagine you want to look something up on Wikipedia. Most people would open a new tab, go to Wikipedia, click the search bar, type the thing, and then search. That’s like four steps for something your browser can do in one.
With this hack, you can type something like: wiki ancient egypt and your browser will immediately search Wikipedia for “ancient egypt” without you ever going to the site first.
The same goes for YouTube, Reddit, Amazon, Google Maps, Twitter/X, Stack Overflow, even your email or Google Drive. Once you set it up, it feels like you have cheat codes for the internet.
What makes this hack so powerful is that it doesn’t just save time—it reduces that low-level mental friction that adds up throughout the day. You know that tiny annoyance of switching tabs, loading pages, and navigating menus? This deletes a lot of it. And when you do it dozens of times a day, the difference is bigger than you’d expect.
The best part is how customizable it is. You can make shortcuts for literally any site with a search function. If you’re someone who constantly checks reviews, looks up recipes, searches forums for advice, or jumps between multiple platforms for work, it becomes a smooth, almost effortless workflow. It’s like turning your browser bar into a universal remote control for the internet.
Setting it up is surprisingly easy, and it works best on Chrome, Brave, Edge, and most Chromium-based browsers. You go into your browser settings, find the section called something like “Search engine” or “Manage search engines,” and then you add a new one. You’ll usually need three things: a name, a keyword shortcut, and a URL template. That URL part sounds technical, but it’s not scary. Most of the time it’s just the website’s search URL with %s where your search term goes.
So for YouTube, the search URL is something like: https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=%s. Once you add it, you can type: yt productivity music and boom—you’re instantly on YouTube results for productivity music.
What’s funny is that once you start doing this, you’ll realize you don’t really “browse” the internet the same way anymore. You stop wandering around websites like you’re walking through a mall and instead start teleporting directly to what you want. It feels clean. Efficient. Slightly addictive.
And if you want to get even more out of it, you can build shortcuts for super specific tasks. Like searching Reddit for a topic without dealing with Reddit’s messy navigation. Or searching Google with a specific filter built in. Or jumping straight into Google Maps searches when you’re trying to find a restaurant or a location.
It’s one of those rare hacks that doesn’t require an app, doesn’t require a subscription, and doesn’t rely on some trendy tool that might disappear in a year. It’s built into the browser you already use, which makes it quietly one of the most high-impact internet upgrades you can make.
The reason I call it underrated is because it’s not flashy. It won’t go viral on TikTok. But it’s the kind of thing that makes you feel like you’re using the internet the way it was meant to be used—fast, direct, and tailored to you.
Once you’ve set up even three or four shortcuts, you’ll wonder how you ever lived without it. It’s like discovering you’ve been walking everywhere your whole life, and suddenly someone hands you a bike.
