Why Helperbird (and Other Extensions) Don't Work on Certain Pages

You open Helperbird and nothing on the page changes, or you turn a feature on and see Refresh the page and try again. On some page addresses no browser extension can run at all.

This article is about the whole of Helperbird being absent. If Helperbird is running and one button is greyed out with a warning badge, read A Helperbird Feature is Not Supported instead.

Which Pages Browsers Block

Your browser will not let any extension run on its own internal pages. It applies to every extension you have installed, not only Helperbird, and there is no setting that turns it off.

How to Tell if This Is Your Problem

Look at the address bar.

• It starts with chrome://, edge:// or about:. Nothing will work here. Open what you want to read in a normal tab.
• It starts with http:// or https://. Helperbird should run, so read the next section.

Pages Helperbird Skips for Other Reasons

Three more cases look the same but are not your browser blocking you.

A file opened from your computer. Helperbird loads on addresses starting with http:// or https://. A file from your hard drive starts with file:///, so Helperbird is not there. For a PDF, open the Helperbird PDF Reader and pick the file from your computer.

A tab you already had open. Helperbird loads into a page while the page loads, so tabs open before you installed or updated it do not have it yet. Refresh the tab.

A site on your exclusion list. Helperbird turns itself off on sites you added to that list. See How to Disable Helperbird on Specific Websites to check it.

Still nothing on an ordinary website? Work through Troubleshooting Common Helperbird Issues.

Need Additional Help?

Tell us the site you were on and the feature you wanted on our feedback page, or contact Helperbird support.