A thumbnail is a reduced size copy of an image. Many websites and search engines include small thumbnails to show image previews. For example, a Google Image search displays thumbnail previews of images that are somewhat larger than those on their websites.
Since thumbnails are usually quite small, it would be nice if Chrome, Firefox, and Edge included options or features to make them larger. However, none of those browsers include features that enable their users to enlarge thumbnails. Nevertheless, you can still enhance the thumbnails in those browsers by adding some useful extensions.
How to enlarge thumbnails with PhotoShow
PhotoShow is an extension that you can install on Chrome, Edge, and Firefox. This extension expands thumbnails on websites when you hover the cursor over them. It works on over 140 website domains. You can install PhotoShow by clicking the Add or Get button on the download pages for the linked browsers below.
After installing PhotoShow, click on the extension button in Chrome or Edge. There you’ll see the PhotoShow button, which you can add to the toolbar by clicking the Pin in Chrome or Edge’s Show in toolbar option. In Firefox, add-on buttons automatically appear on the toolbar.
The BBC website is a good one to try out this extension as it includes lots of thumbnails. Open the homepage of that site, and then move your cursor over the thumbnail. You will notice that the extension expands the thumbnails by displaying them just above, below, left or right.
PhotoShow has mini, light, and panoramic enlargement modes for thumbnails. Mini is the smallest mode that displays expanded images within an eighth field outside of the thumbnails. Panoramic is the largest which shows the thumbnail at its full original size.
You can change the mode by clicking the PhotoShow button in the extension’s settings and selecting Mini, Light, Panoramic, or Auto (any of the three).
PhotoShow also enables you to rotate the enlarged thumbnail image. To do this, hover the mouse cursor over the thumbnail. Then press the Shift + Ctrl + ← or → arrow key combination to rotate the enlarged picture.
You can select additional options from PhotoShow’s context menu. Right-click a thumbnail on a website and choose the PhotoShow submenu. Then you can select open hd image in new tab, save hd image and copy hd image address option.
You can turn off PhotoShow’s thumbnail enlargement when you don’t want to turn it on for a specific website. Press the PhotoShow extension button, and click the toggle switch off at the top of its setting. To more broadly disable its thumbnail enlargement, deselect the Enable basic support on unknown websites option.
How to increase thumbnail with images
Imagus is an alternative thumbnail enlargement extension for Edge, Chrome and Firefox. This extension works similarly to PhotoShow, but you’ll need to use more of its keyboard shortcuts to expand thumbnails. You can view and download the images from the linked pages below.
To try Images, open Google and enter a keyword into that search engine. Click on images to see thumbnail previews of images matching the keywords. Then hover your cursor over a thumbnail to see an overlay image of it.
Overlay images will appear no larger than their thumbnails. To expand them, you’ll need to activate the extension’s full-zoom mode. After hovering your cursor over a thumbnail, press the Z key. This will centralize the pop-up image and enable you to expand it. To enlarge the overlay picture, press the + key to zoom in.
Imagus will work on at least 318 websites listed in that extension’s tab. To see that list of supported sites, click the sieve next to the Shortcuts tab. You can then input a site into that tab’s search box to check if it’s listed there.
To further configure the extension, select Preferences on the Imagus tab. There, you can configure settings for the extension’s image caption and pop-up appearance. It also includes options to change the way zoom-able elements are marked and to activate full-zoom mode with the right button of the mouse.
How to increase thumbnail with zoom image
The Zoom Image add-on is available exclusively for Mozilla Firefox. It’s a little different from PhotoShow and Imagus because it doesn’t magnify images when you hover over them. Instead, its users can expand the thumbnails by selecting the Zoom image context menu options. To install Zoom Image click on the link below and select Add to Firefox.
