Better GitHub

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Better GitHub is a Chrome extension that enhances the GitHub experience. Inspired by Refined GitHub, but with hundreds of fiddly toggles trimmed away. It stays lightweight and focuses on the experience improvements that matter, so it's maintainable for the long haul.

Open source and zero-tracking — no analytics, no telemetry; all your data stays in your browser. (Some features require a GitHub token with the repo scope.)

Features Overview

• Contributor profile insights — quickly tell whether a contributor is just an "AI-coding account that spams low-quality commits."
• Better PR and issue lists — sort by most recently updated, with branch names, review status, and diff stats all at a glance.
• Repository extras — a dedicated Releases tab, hover previews for watcher/fork/star counts, plus commit tags and diff stats.

Every feature can be individually toggled on or off in the settings.

Note: Because GitHub frequently A/B tests features and offers extra toggles under Feature Preview, features that are hard to maintain or change often may not be added — the goal is to keep the project at a manageable complexity.

Feature Details

Home

• Better Top Repositories — Auto-expand the "Top repositories" sidebar list and pin your favorite repos to the top. Works on the dashboard, feed page, and navigation drawer.

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PRs and issues

• Default Sort by Updated — Sort PR and issue lists by recently updated instead of GitHub's default creation time order. No more missing active PRs.

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• PR Branch Names — Display source branch name next to each PR title. Click to copy.

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• PR Review Status — Show review thread resolution status (resolved / unresolved) on the PR list. Only appears on PRs that have review threads; PRs without any review comments won't show a badge. Draft PRs are also excluded.

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• PR Diff Stats — Show additions, deletions, and changed file count (e.g. +223 −114 · 5 files) on each row of the PR list. Requires a token.

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• PR Label Position — Move labels to the front of PR titles for better visibility and scanning.

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PR details

• PR Approve Now — Add an "approve now" shortcut to the Reviewers sidebar on PR detail pages for quick approval. Requires a token.

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• Collapse/Expand All Files — Add buttons to the diff toolbar to collapse or expand all file diffs in one click, plus a button inside the file tree to collapse or expand all folders. Works on PR, commit, and compare pages, and compatible with both the old and the new "Files changed" experience.

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Profile

• Contributor Card — Hover a username to append a panel of objective facts to GitHub's native hovercard: account age, relation to the current repo (first-time vs. returning contributor), historical PR merge rate, and last-year activity. Helps you size up an unfamiliar contributor at a glance — for instance, spotting mass-generated low-effort PRs. Facts only: no scoring, no labels. The activity row requires a token.

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Commits

• Commit Tags — Show git tags as badges on the commits list page, so you can instantly see which commits are tagged releases.

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• Commit Diff Stats — Show additions, deletions, and changed file count (e.g. +223 −114 · 5 files) on each row of the commits list page. Requires a token.

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Repository

• Releases Tab — Add a Releases tab to the repository navigation bar for quick access.

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• Watch/Fork/Star Popup — Hover over the Watch, Fork, or Star counts on a repo page to preview the full list of watchers, forks, or stargazers in a popup, with "View all" links to the full pages. Results are cached for 5 minutes to minimize API calls.

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• Recent Commit Message Color — Highlight recent commits with color based on their age, making it easy to spot the latest changes. Always on.

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All features except Recent Commit Message Color can be individually toggled on/off in the extension options.

Removed Features

• Release Asset Downloads — Removed after GitHub updated the Releases page to show release asset download counts natively. Discovered on 2026-07-01.

Build from Source

1. Clone the repo and build:

   pnpm install
   pnpm build

2. Open chrome://extensions, enable Developer mode, click Load unpacked, and select the dist folder.

Install from Chrome Web Store

Chrome Web Store - Better GitHub

Configuration

Right-click the extension icon → Options:

• GitHub Token — A classic personal access token for private repos and review status. Needs repo scope. Create one here.
• Feature Toggles — Enable or disable each feature individually. Changes take effect immediately.