Wayback Machine Quick-Access

About

Want to see what a website looked like last month, last year, or a decade ago? The Wayback Machine has billions of archived pages — but finding the right snapshot takes too many clicks. You have to copy the URL, navigate to archive.org, paste it in, and wait for results.

Wayback Machine Quick-Access puts the entire Internet Archive at your fingertips.

Click the extension icon on any page and instantly see if an archived snapshot exists, when it was captured, and how old it is. One more click opens the latest snapshot or lets you browse the full archive timeline. If the page hasn't been archived yet, you can save it to the Wayback Machine right from the popup.

**How it works:**
When you open the popup, it queries the Wayback Machine Availability API for the current page's URL. If an archived snapshot exists, it displays the capture date, relative age, and direct links to view it. The background service worker also checks each page you visit and updates the toolbar badge so you can see archive status at a glance — without even opening the popup.

**Key Features:**

- **Instant snapshot lookup** — see the latest Wayback Machine archive date for any page in seconds
- **One-click open** — jump straight to the most recent archived version
- **Browse all snapshots** — open the full Wayback Machine calendar timeline for the current URL
- **Archive this page** — submit unarchived pages to the Wayback Machine's Save Page Now service
- **Badge indicator** — toolbar badge shows archive availability status for every tab automatically
- **Recently checked** — popup displays your 5 most recently checked URLs for quick reference
- **Smart caching** — background worker caches API responses for 5 minutes to avoid redundant requests
- **Date formatting** — shows both the full capture date and a human-readable relative age (e.g., "3 months ago")
- **Debounced tab tracking** — badge updates are debounced to avoid hammering the API during rapid navigation
- **Re-check button** — manually re-query the archive if you think a newer snapshot might exist

**100% local. No servers. No accounts. No data collection.**
Wayback Machine Quick-Access communicates only with the Internet Archive's public API (archive.org) to check snapshot availability. No data is sent anywhere else. Your recently checked URLs are stored locally and never transmitted. No analytics, no tracking, no telemetry.

**Perfect for:**
Researchers checking source history, journalists verifying deleted content, developers debugging broken pages, SEO professionals tracking site changes, and anyone curious about the history of the web.