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Search Reddit Comments - In-Thread Find icon

Search Reddit Comments - In-Thread Find

Search Reddit comments across a whole thread, including collapsed ones, then jump between highlighted matches like Ctrl+F.

Works on
Chrome
Version
3.0.3
Add to Chrome

You know the reply is somewhere in this thread, but Ctrl+F keeps coming up empty because half the comments are collapsed. This adds a find bar that reads every comment body in the thread and expands a collapsed one the moment it holds a match.

Trying to find one reply in a long Reddit thread? Browser Ctrl+F only matches what's on screen and skips every collapsed comment. This adds a search bar that scans all comments in the thread, including the collapsed ones.

Type a word and it highlights every match, keeps a live match counter, and steps through hits one at a time. When a match sits inside a collapsed comment, that comment expands so you can read it in context. Works on new Reddit (shreddit), old.reddit.com, and the older React redesign.

It leaves the browser's own Ctrl+F alone. The bar opens with its own shortcut, so native Find keeps working.

Screenshots

What it does

  • Searches every comment in a thread, including collapsed ones

  • Expands a collapsed comment when it contains a match

  • Live match counter (e.g. 3/17) with next / previous navigation

  • Highlights all matches at once, case-insensitive

  • Own shortcut (Ctrl/Cmd+Shift+F) so browser Ctrl+F is never hijacked

  • Works on new Reddit, old Reddit, and the React redesign

  • Follows Reddit's light and dark themes

  • Only runs on comment thread pages

When you'd reach for it

  • Finding one reply in a 2,000-comment thread

    Big threads bury the answer under nested chains and collapsed branches. Press Ctrl+Shift+F, type a word, and every occurrence inside comment bodies is highlighted at once with a counter like 3/17. Enter walks forward through the matches, Shift+Enter walks back.

  • Checking whether something was already said

    Before you post, you want to know if someone already made the point. Search the term and read the count: zero means nobody used that wording, twelve means scroll through them. The search covers comment text only, so the post title, sidebar and navigation never pad the results.

  • Digging through old.reddit and the new layout

    Reddit runs several front-ends at once and each nests comments differently. The bar targets shreddit comment slots, the React redesign's comment test IDs, and old.reddit's markdown bodies, so the same shortcut works whichever version loads. It only activates on URLs containing /comments/.

How to use it

  1. 01Open any Reddit comment thread. A magnifier button shows up at the bottom right.
  2. 02Click it (or press Ctrl+Shift+F, Cmd+Shift+F on Mac) to open the search bar.
  3. 03Type to highlight matches. Enter jumps to the next match, Shift+Enter to the previous, Esc closes the bar.

Permissions & privacy

This extension declares no special permissions. Installing it gives it access to nothing on any site.

It runs only the code shipped inside the package — no remote code is fetched.

Questions people ask

How do I search comments inside a Reddit thread?

Open the thread and press Ctrl+Shift+F, or Cmd+Shift+F on a Mac. A bar opens at the bottom right; type and matches highlight as you go, with Enter for the next hit, Shift+Enter for the previous, and Esc to close. There is also a magnifier button in the corner if you would rather click.

Why doesn't Ctrl+F find collapsed comments on Reddit?

The browser's Find only looks at text the page has actually rendered, and Reddit collapses deep or downvoted comment chains out of the DOM's visible flow. This walks the comment bodies directly, so collapsed branches are included in the count. When you jump to a match that sits inside a collapsed comment, that comment is expanded first.

Does it break the browser's own Ctrl+F?

No. The shortcut deliberately uses Ctrl/Cmd+Shift+F, and native Find is left untouched, so you can still use it for the post body or anything else on the page. The two work side by side.

What permissions does this extension request?

None. The manifest declares no chrome permissions and no host_permissions at all — the only access is a content script matched to https://*.reddit.com/*, which is what covers www, old, sh and np subdomains with one script. It uses no chrome.storage and cannot run on any site other than reddit.com.

Is the search case sensitive, and are there limits?

Matching is case-insensitive substring matching, so typing "api" also finds "API". Highlighting stops at 1,000 matches and scanning stops at 8,000 text nodes, which is a guard so an enormous thread cannot freeze the tab. For normal threads you will never reach either ceiling.

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