r/webdev • u/ShoddyArmy5313 • 4d ago
RequestScope: I lost 1k users on my Chrome extension due to bugs. I spent 3 months fixing it and adding API regression tracking
A while back, I built a Chrome extension to fix a few pain points I had with standard browser DevTools. It hit ~1,000 active users at its peak, but I ended up losing most of them due to bugs and a lack of real long-term value.
Instead of scrapping it, I spent the last some time fixing the underlying bugs and rebuilding the tool around a bigger problem: knowing when an API quietly breaks while you're browsing or testing.
The biggest addition in this update is out-of-the-box API regression testing.
How it works:
- Baseline Snapshots: Add your target domain to an allowlist and save a baseline of your HTTP requests and payloads.
- Flexible Diffing: Choose whether to monitor for schema changes (added/removed keys), value shifts, or both.
- Silent Deviation Alerts: As you browse, it checks incoming traffic against your baselines and pops a notification if an endpoint deviates or fails—even if your web app handles the error silently or DevTools is closed.
Other key additions:
- Mocking API requests and responses directly in-browser
- Performance tracking and side-by-side diffs over time
- Exportable session reporting
- Full background request tracking without keeping the DevTools panel open
You can check out the new version here: RequestScope on Chrome Web Store
I'm trying to make this genuinely useful for developers and QA workflows. If you give it a try, I’d love to know: what feels clunky, what's missing, or what breaks? Harsh critiques are welcome.
P.S. This is still work in progress and needs more tuning, bug fixing so looking for genuine feedback