Tips to print web pages without ads in Chrome, Firefox, Edge, Opera and Safari.
Most web pages have a “Print” option somewhere on the page, but if you run into one that doesn’t have a print function, doesn’t print properly or one that includes ads, here are some ways to print a web page from your browser minus the advertising. The bonus is that less paper and ink are used in printing pages.
This article (link below) has complete screenshots and directions detailing how to print a page with no ads for Chrome, Firefox and Opera.
Here are the basic directions for each browser, with more details at the article below:
Chrome: Google Chrome doesn’t have Mozilla’s Reader View built in yet (it’s planned for an upcoming release) but there’s an extension that will add the same functionality. To use, download Reader View and install it. It will add an icon to the toolbar next to the address field. It can be customized by right clicking the icon and choosing “Extension options”.
Firefox: Mozilla has built Reader View into Firefox. If a page has Reader View enabled, an icon (a small page icon with lines) will show up in the address field, next to the three-dot menu. To use it, click on the Reader View icon. It will turn blue and the page will be reloaded in Reader View.
Bonus Firefox tip: the three-dot menu in the address field has a built in screenshot option. Click on the three dots, choose “Take a screenshot” and choose “Save full page” or “Save visible”. To save visible, click and drag your mouse around the area you want to save. You can fine tune the area by releasing the mouse button and hovering the mouse over the line on any side of your selection, then clicking and dragging the mouse where you want it. When done, choose Copy or Download.
Opera: Opera does a pretty good job of letting you choose what to print from the print dialog. I’d like to see the option in all browsers. If the dialog box options are less than what you want, you can install the Reader View extension from the Chrome web store in Opera. See How to Install Chrome Extensions in Opera for directions.
Safari: to print without ads in Safari, you can either remove the Print backgrounds checkmark before printing or use Safari’s built-in Reader. To use the Reader, click on the icon in the left-hand corner of the address (it looks like a couple of rows of very small text).
Reader View isn’t just for printing web pages. It displays the contents of a web page in an uncluttered format, making it easier to focus on what you want to read.
Not all web pages support Reader View. If the website you are visiting doesn’t support Reader View, the Reader icon in the toolbar won’t be visible.
If the Reader icon isn’t visible, there are two sites that specialize in printing web pages:
Print Friendly has Firefox, Chrome and Edge extensions and bookmarklets for other browsers (IE, Safari, Other). It will print a web page or create a PDF from the URL you want printed and has editing options for removing content you don’t want printed.
PrintWhatYouLike has a Chrome extension and a bookmarklet that can be dragged and dropped onto a browser tool bar, and can print a web page using the URL of the site you want to print. It has editing options for removing and content you don’t want.
Both do a great job of formatting most pages for print, though some pages that don’t support Reader View don’t display or print well in either service.
If you have Microsoft Word, you can copy the content you want from a web page and paste it into a new Word document. From there you can remove most of the content you don’t want. Removing content from some web pages changes the formatting with varying results.
This article at Digital Citizeno has more details and screenshots on how to print without ads in Chrome, Firefox and Opera:
How do I print a page from a website, without ads?