Show HN: HN Companion – web app that enhances the experience of reading HN

6 hours ago

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HN Companion is a browser extension for Hacker News that provides AI-powered summaries of comment threads.
It highlights key debates, contrasting viewpoints, and notable side discussions, preserving the hierarchical structure of conversations.
Features include jumping to specific comments from summaries, navigating to other comments by the same author, and user profile info on hover.
The extension is fully customizable, allowing users to choose their AI model (OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, OpenRouter) or use free cached summaries.
It supports keyboard-first navigation with Vim-inspired shortcuts (j/k, h/l, c) for efficient browsing.
HN Companion is free, open-source, and available for Chrome, Firefox, Edge, and other Chromium-based browsers.
Privacy-focused: no analytics or tracking, with API keys stored locally and optional local model usage via Ollama.
Pre-generated cached summaries are available for popular discussions to save on API costs.
A web app and bookmarklet are available for those who prefer not to install the extension.

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