Chrome extension

The Chrome extension runs on your laptop while you present. It shows the audience’s reactions on your Google Slides and it’s where you start and stop the sessions you’ll see on your dashboard.

Install

Add Speechwave on the Chrome Web Store to Chrome. Once it’s installed, the Speechwave icon appears in your toolbar.

Connect your account

Click the Speechwave icon in your toolbar. The first time you open it, it asks you to paste your Speechwave API key to get started, with a link to Account Settings, where the key lives (where to find your API key). Paste your key into the field and click Save Key.

If you ever need to swap in a different key (say, after regenerating one), click Change API key near the bottom of the popup.

Connect to a talk

Once your key is saved, the popup shows a Talk Slug field. Enter the slug for the talk you’re presenting (find it on your dashboard, labeled “Slug for browser extension”), then click Connect.

The status dot turns green and the text next to it changes from “Disconnected” to “Connected” once you’re in. The same button turns into Disconnect if you need to leave and connect to a different talk.

Present

Open your Google Slides presentation. Reactions show up as a floating overlay in the bottom-right corner of the slide, whether you’re presenting directly from the editor, in a windowed Present view, or full-screen.

Important: after installing or updating the extension, refresh any Google Slides tabs you already had open before you connect. Chrome doesn’t load the update into tabs that were already open, so the overlay won’t appear until you reload them.

Overlay size and fireworks aren’t set here in the popup. They live on your Account Settings page, and any change there takes effect the next time you connect.

Sessions from the extension

Once you’re connected, the popup shows a session area below the connect button. Click Start Session to begin recording reactions for this run of your talk. The button changes to Stop Session while one is running, along with a slide indicator that shows the current slide number, or a placeholder if none is detected yet. Click Stop Session when you’re done presenting. Your dashboard is where you rename sessions and review their analytics afterward.

Note: slide-number tracking, and per-slide analytics on your dashboard afterward, require clicking Present in Google Slides. If you present directly from the editor without clicking Present, the emoji overlay still works, but the slide indicator stays on its placeholder and reactions aren’t attributed to a slide.

Common errors

If the popup shows “Talk is at capacity,” the talk has reached its participant limit. See troubleshooting.

If you see “Please confirm your email before using the extension,” confirm your email from the link Speechwave sent you, then reconnect. See troubleshooting.

If you see “Invalid API key or you don’t own this talk,” re-copy your key from Account Settings and use Change API key to update it in the popup. See troubleshooting.