How do I get Chrome to auto-complete URL's?

Question

In Safari on OS X, I can just type "cnn" & Safari will fill in the "www." & ".com". How do I get Chrome to do this?

** Edit ** Yes, I know about ctrl+enter, or in my case, Apple-Command+Enter. The point is to not have to do that. With Safari, I don't have to.

Solution 1

The Chrome Omnibar predicts web domains and web searches as you type into it. Once you've visited a site several times, it should start predicting that domain as you begin typing it.

This is somewhat different from other browsers, which search your history for matching patterns (auto-complete). I think this is a trade-off, which makes Chrome more flexible, but increases the amount of time before it "remembers" your favorite sites.

Solution 2

In Chrome if you type what you want into the URL bar, then hold Ctrl and press Enter (Ctrl + Enter) it will add "www." and ".com".

E.g. Type superuser, hold Ctrl and press Enter. Chrome loads www.superuser.com

Solution 3

The best way of doing this natively is to define a 'New' search engine in the Preferences.

You can define a url to search with, and insert the string anywhere in this url using the '%s' variable. For example, if you set the url to be

http://%s.com

And set your new search engine to be the default, and it will then prefix add a http:// and append a .com to all address bar input that is not recognized as a valid URL.

Solution 4

When you type something other than a URL in the address bar, Firefox performs a Google "I'm Feeling Lucky" search, which is why just typing in cnn will take you to http://www.cnn.com/ but typing in slashdot would take you to http://slashdot.org/, and typing in World War II will take you to the Wikipedia article on that subject. I wouldn't be surprised if Safari did something similar.

To get that behavior on Google Chrome, just change your default search provider to:

http://www.google.com/search?q=%s&btnI=I'm%20Feeling%20Lucky

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Comments

[Christoph Rüegg]

You've got to be clearer otherwise you do get so many dupe answers about something you apparently know about but people don't know you know, y'know? Also, are you talking about site you've never visited before? Details matter.

[churnd]

Yes, I've seen that feature. I'm just finding the Safari auto-complete habit a hard one to break. I do not like being redirected to a Google search.

[churnd]

That's pretty sneaky, but it would assume all URL's end in .com. It's close, though. :)

[JT.WK]

heh this is true; but if you want something that will guess the second level domain, I don't think such a thing can be done. How will it handle www.test.com Vs. www.test.net?

[blee]

I remember a similar feeling when I switched from Firefox. But if you think about it, having your browser guess www and .com for you for domains you've never previously visited could be troublesome. There are more TLDs than just .com (even if it's the most common).