Why Isn't Highlighty Highlighting? A Troubleshooting Guide

You installed Highlighty, saved a few colored keywords, and opened a page where you know the words appear. Nothing lights up. It's an annoying moment, and it usually has a plain cause.

This is a checklist, roughly in the order worth trying. Most of the time it's the first item. A few of the later ones are limits no extension can get around, and we'll be honest about those.

TL;DR

• Installed on a tab that was already open? Refresh it. Extensions only attach to pages loaded after they're installed.
• Check your Allowed / Disallowed website lists (Advanced → White/blacklist features) — the site may be excluded.
• You may have paused coloring on this page with the Quick disable hotkey (Shift+D). Press it again or reload.
• Text inside a cross-origin iframe or a custom widget's internal layer can't be reached by any extension.
• If Manual search mode is on, search only runs when you press Shift+F.
• Check the browser's own per-extension site-access setting, and give very large pages a moment to finish.

1. You installed on a tab that was already open — refresh it

This is the single most common cause. When you add an extension, it attaches to pages that load after it's installed, not to tabs that were already sitting open.

So the tab where you're testing was loaded before Highlighty existed in your browser. Reload the page (or close and reopen the tab) and the highlighting should appear. After installing, it's worth refreshing every tab you want it to work on.

2. The site is on your Allowed or Disallowed list

Highlighty has two lists that decide where it runs. "Allowed websites" means the extension only runs on the domains you list. "Disallowed websites" means it never runs on the domains you list. Both live at Popup → Advanced → White/blacklist features.

If you set up an Allowed list and the current site isn't on it, Highlighty stays quiet — that's the list doing its job. Likewise if the site landed on your Disallowed list. Open that group and check whether the current domain is in the wrong place.

3. Coloring is paused on this page (Shift+D)

There's a Quick disable hotkey — Shift+D — that turns off highlighting of your found queries on the current page only. It's easy to hit by accident, and it's per-page, so other tabs keep working while this one looks broken.

Press Shift+D again to turn coloring back on for the page, or just reload it.

4. The text is inside a cross-origin iframe

Some pages embed content from a different website inside a frame — an embedded document viewer, a comment widget, a third-party app. The browser blocks every extension from reading inside those cross-origin frames. It's a security rule, not a Highlighty limitation, and we can't override it.

If the text you're looking for lives inside one of those embedded frames, no extension will find it. That's the honest answer.

5. The text is locked inside a custom widget

A handful of custom widgets keep their text in their own internal layer rather than in the normal page. That text isn't reachable by extensions either — again, this affects every extension, not just Highlighty.

If a page seems to show a word the highlighter can't catch, items 4 and 5 cover almost all of those cases.

6. Manual search mode is on

Manual search mode (Popup → Basic → Hotkey features) turns off automatic re-searching. With it on, Highlighty waits and only runs the search when you press Shift+F.

If you turned this on earlier and forgot, the page will look like nothing's happening until you press Shift+F. Either press it, or turn the mode off to go back to automatic highlighting.

7. The browser is restricting site access for the extension

Separate from Highlighty's own lists, your browser has a per-extension setting for which sites an extension may run on. If it's set to "on click" or limited to specific sites, Highlighty won't run on the current page until you allow it.

Open your browser's extensions area, find Highlighty's site-access setting, and make sure the current site is permitted.

8. The page is very large and still working

Scanning a very large page with many saved queries is CPU-intensive. On an older machine, or with many tabs open at once, highlighting can take a moment to catch up.

Give it a few seconds. If it's consistently slow, trimming the number of active queries or closing some tabs helps.

Still stuck?

If you've worked through all eight and the text still won't highlight, email hey@highlighty.app with the page you're trying it on. Some pages are genuinely unusual, and a real example helps us diagnose it.

Frequently asked questions

I just installed Highlighty and nothing highlights — what's wrong?

Almost always, the tab was already open before you installed. Extensions only attach to pages loaded after installation, so reload the page (or reopen the tab) and the highlighting will appear. After installing, refresh every tab you want it to work on.

Why does it work on some sites but not others?

Check your Allowed / Disallowed lists at Popup → Advanced → White/blacklist features — an Allowed list limits Highlighty to listed domains, and a Disallowed list blocks the ones you've named. Your browser's own per-extension site-access setting can also restrict where it runs.

Highlighting suddenly stopped on one page only

You may have pressed the Quick disable hotkey, Shift+D, which pauses coloring on the current page only. Press Shift+D again or reload the page to bring it back.

Why can't Highlighty find a word I can clearly see on the page?

Two cases account for most of these: the text is inside a cross-origin iframe (another website embedded in the page, which browsers block extensions from reading), or it's inside a custom widget that keeps its text in its own internal layer. That text is unreachable to any extension, not just Highlighty.

I press the hotkey but nothing happens until I press something else

You likely have Manual search mode on (Popup → Basic → Hotkey features). It turns off automatic re-searching, so the search only runs when you press Shift+F. Press Shift+F, or switch the mode off to return to automatic highlighting.

It's highlighting, but it's really slow

Scanning very large pages with many active queries is CPU-intensive, especially on older machines with many tabs open. Give it a few seconds to finish, and consider reducing the number of active queries or open tabs.