The Most Underrated Features in Browser DevTools

Browser DevTools have become powerful tools, yet many developers only use a small part of what's available. While the Elements panel, Console, and Network tab are familiar, many useful features still go unnoticed. These features can greatly improve your debugging efficiency, performance checks, and overall code quality.

Below are some of the most ignored features along with practical examples of how you can apply them in real projects.

Local Overrides

Local Overrides let you change resources from any website and keep those changes even after reloading the page.

Example: You spot a layout issue on a live site. Instead of changing CSS in the Elements panel and losing your edits after a refresh, you enable Local Overrides, update the CSS file, and reload the page to make sure the fix works consistently.

CSS Overview

The CSS Overview panel provides a summary of the main aspects of your site's styles.

Example: You run CSS Overview on a large app and find out you're using twelve different shades of blue. This helps you narrow down your color choices and maintain a more consistent design.

Request Blocking

Request Blocking lets you simulate missing or failing network resources.

Example: You block a specific API call to ensure your error handling shows the correct fallback UI when the server is down.

Performance Insights

Performance Insights automatically checks for performance issues and offers suggestions on how to improve.

Example: You record a session, and the tool highlights that a large image is slowing down the Largest Contentful Paint. It identifies the file causing the delay and recommends compressing or resizing it.

Animations Panel

The Animations panel gives you precise control over CSS animations and Web Animations API effects.

Example: You slow the animation to 10 percent speed to check a small jitter that occurs during the transition. The panel indicates that a transform property is being recalculated unnecessarily.

Accessibility Tree

The Accessibility Tree shows how screen readers and other assistive tools interpret your interface.

Example: You examine a modal and see that the Accessibility Tree does not recognize it as a dialog. This prompts you to adjust the ARIA role so screen readers interact with it correctly.

Network Conditions

Network Conditions allow you to test your site under various speeds and user agents.

Example: You throttle the network to a slow 3G speed and find that your homepage takes over ten seconds to load. This encourages you to reduce image sizes and limit how much JavaScript runs at startup.

Coverage Tab

The Coverage tab identifies unused CSS and JavaScript.

Example: You run Coverage on an older codebase and discover that about 40 percent of a large CSS file is never used. This helps you remove unused selectors and reduce your bundle size.

Snippets

Snippets serve as a built-in library of reusable scripts.

Example: You create a Snippet that highlights all focusable elements on the page. Whenever you work on accessibility, you run this Snippet to quickly check how keyboard navigation flows through the interface.

Console Utility Functions

DevTools includes several built-in Console helpers that boost debugging efficiency.

Example: You select an element in the Elements panel and type $0 to reference it immediately. Then you run getComputedStyle($0) to check its final computed styles without having to query the DOM yourself.

Conclusion

Browser DevTools offer numerous helpful features that many developers overlook. Using these tools can speed up debugging, enhance performance checks, and lead to better code. If you found this useful, please like or leave a comment. I welcome feedback or suggestions for making future articles clearer or more helpful.