In this video, I take a look at a browser extension that manipulates the Business Central UI to give users a better experience. Check it out:
In this video, Erik explores a clever browser extension called BC Maximizer that solves one of the most common frustrations Business Central users face: the wasted screen real estate on widescreen monitors. Instead of manually clicking the expand button on every single page, this extension automatically maximizes the Business Central UI to use your full screen width.
The Problem: Wasted Screen Space
If you’ve worked with Business Central, you’ve likely noticed this annoyance. When you’re on certain pages — like a Role Center — the UI uses the full width of your screen. But the moment you click “Edit List” or navigate to another page, the content snaps back to a narrow, centered layout, leaving large empty margins on both sides.
Sure, you can click the expand icon in the top-right corner of the page to widen the view, but you have to do that on every single page you visit. For users who paid good money for a widescreen monitor, that’s a frustrating workflow.
The Old Approach: JavaScript Hacks
Erik mentions that in a previous video on the channel, he tackled this problem using JavaScript — injecting code that would programmatically click the expand button or manipulate the page layout. That approach worked but was somewhat hacky and had to be done on a per-page basis. They even experimented with putting JavaScript in the top bar to automate things, but it wasn’t the cleanest solution.
The New Approach: BC Maximizer Browser Extension
Erik spotted something on LinkedIn: a developer named Milan created a browser extension called BC Maximizer specifically for Business Central. It’s available on the Chrome Web Store, but since Microsoft Edge is Chromium-based, it works perfectly there too. Edge is even smart enough to recognize when you’re browsing the Chrome Web Store and lets you install extensions directly.
Installation
The installation process is dead simple:
- Navigate to the Chrome Web Store and search for “BC Maximizer”
- Click “Add Extension”
- Edge (or Chrome) confirms: “BC Maximizer has been added”
- Optionally pin the extension icon to your toolbar for visibility
- Allow it to run in private/InPrivate mode if desired
There’s essentially no setup or configuration — you install it and it just works.
How It Works in Practice
After installing the extension and reloading Business Central, Erik navigates through several pages to test it out:
- Chart of Accounts (Edit List) — Initially didn’t seem to trigger, but after a reload things started working
- Purchase Return Orders — The page displayed in full width automatically
- Bank Account Card — Full width
- Bank Ledger Entries — Full width
- Statistics pages — Full width
- Vendors list — Full width
- Job Ledger Entries & Job Statistics — Full width
The extension essentially auto-clicks the maximize/expand button for you on every page you visit. As Erik puts it: “It just helps you click. I like it.”
Can You Override It Per Page?
Erik tested whether you could selectively un-maximize a specific page. For instance, he clicked the collapse button on the Bank Account Card to narrow it back down. When he navigated away and opened a different card, it was wide again — the extension re-applied the maximized state. However, it doesn’t appear to offer a way to permanently exclude specific pages from being maximized.
Erik mentions his Tic Tac Toe game built in Business Central (a fun older video on the channel) as an example of a page where wide mode actually breaks the layout. For cases like that, there doesn’t seem to be a per-page override mechanism — but for the vast majority of use cases, always-maximized is exactly what you want.
Why a Browser Extension Is a Smart Approach
What makes this approach elegant compared to the old JavaScript hacks is that a browser extension has access to the entire page DOM. It can interact with any element on any Business Central page without needing to inject code through AL or modify the application itself. It’s:
- Clean — No custom code in your Business Central environment
- Universal — Works across all pages and all Business Central environments
- Simple — Install once, no configuration needed
- Non-invasive — It’s just clicking a button that’s already there
Conclusion
BC Maximizer is a small but impactful quality-of-life improvement for anyone who works in Business Central on a widescreen monitor. It takes a common annoyance — having to manually expand every page — and eliminates it entirely with a zero-configuration browser extension. If you find yourself constantly clicking that expand icon, give it a try. And as Erik says: send Milan some love for creating this free tool for the community!
