The “Open with Google Drive Viewer” is a browser extension for Google Chrome. It creates an entry in the context menu (right-click menu) to open links using Google Drive’s online file viewer tool. Google Drive Viewer supports various file formats including PDF, DOC, PPT, HTML etc.
You can use this tiny Chrome extension to open several file formats like Word (DOC and DOCX), Excel (XLS and XLSX), PowerPoint (.PPT and .PPTX), PDF, ZIP, RAR, Autodesk AutoCad (.DXF), Adobe Illustrator (.AI), Adobe Photoshop (.PSD), SVG, TXT etc. Only restriction is that the file should be online and publicly accessible.
There are several benefits of using Google Drive Viewer over any other application installed on your computer. First of all, you don’t need to have any specific software installed on your computer. For example, to open an online DOC file, you don’t need to download the file first and then open it using Microsoft Word or LibreOffice Write.
Additionally, opening an online file may be quite risky on your computer as it may contains some malicious code. While, opening it using an online viewer is quite safe as the file is processed on a remote server.
Once you open a file in Google Drive Viewer, you can easily save that file to your Google Drive account just with a click.
Links:
- Install the Chrome extension from Chrome Web Store
- Test working of this extension here
- Try my other useful browser extensions
Related: 3 Best Tools To Open PowerPoint Files Online
You should also check another similar extension, “Open with MS Office Online”, which enables users to open Word, PowerPoint and Excel files using Microsoft’s Office Online viewer.
I love using this extension on my chromebook. I use for many file formats apart from office files. Google Workspace is the best office suite for chromebook.
this extension works good, but could you please a feature to convert excel to csv online? Like when I right click on any excel file link as above, there should be an option to import excel to CSV. That 1-click solution would be amazing.
Thanks.
i want to download a pes file to use with my embroidery machine. can I use this chromebook to download the file from the website then transfer to my embroidery machine
I have no clue how to use this i am trying to exract a zip link so i can open it on chrome, but it won’t let me and this extension is not working
Did not install on my Android phone, hopefully it is there when I am on a PC. I need to open and view and cut and paste/ or create a link to an html.zip file that is in my google drive. But first I need to get rid of the .zip extension, it is bothering me and I need to just view it and link to it as an .html document.
@gavriel: if a file is already saved in Google Drive, you can directly open it in Google Drive Viewer, just by clicking on it. You don’t need this extension for that.
can i open pdf files that I have saved in google drive with this extension? when I right click on my pdf it doesnt give me an option of google drive viewer (I already downloaded the extension and its in my toolbar))
@Rhys: It works on Ubuntu and all other platforms where Chrome does. I guess you are opening links pointing to HTML pages. Try to open any link pointing to any Office file.
Does it work for Ubuntu? It works for your example links but not for the others i’ve tested so far (!) instead it opens drive but instead of the document I get a bunch of html code.
@Roo: I would recommend you to first download the PDF files to your computer, and then upload it manually to the Google Drive. Seems no better way in your case.
I have been looking for a way to save PDFs that come from a link in Chrome, which normally opens up in a Chrome tab automatically, and save it to Drive. I added your extension and I right-clicked a link to a PDF file on the UMass Blackboard website (shares files, gives exams, post grades, etc) and chose to open with Google Drive. Alas, there was “no preview” and therefore I could not save directly to Drive. When I click the link normally, it opens directly in a Chrome tab but I can’t save it to Drive. I have to download and upload. Any advice?
Does not work on a chromebook.
@JcJ: First install the extension, then visit this test page: http://browsernativeapps.wpcomstaging.com/test/drive.php
Now right click on link to PDF, Word or JS file — you should see extension’s option “Open with Google Drive Viewer”. Click on it, you would be redirected to the Google Drive Viewer.
I could not get the extension to open.