Chegg has been one of the most successful education technology companies that has seen huge increases in popularity and revenue over the last few years. But you may find that the answer you want is blurred. So how to unblur answers on Chegg?
Unblurring answers on Chegg is done via using Inspect element in your browser, signing up for a free trial, contacting Chegg answer groups or finding mirror websites. Chegg is making it harder to use these methods, however.
We’ll go through these individual methods and explain in detail how to use them, the pros and cons of each, and also consider the wider context on how Chegg works and whether it is legitimate to use it or not.
Ways to Unblur Answers on Chegg
Chegg uses a blurring feature on the answers to show that they have an answer for the question that is posted already. As the answer can be partially seen underneath the blur, naturally a lot of people want to know if it can be unblurred.
Chegg is constantly changing their website to make this blurring feature harder to circumvent, and many of the tips and tricks for doing this, such as using browser extensions, no longer work.
However, the below tips seem to work at least some of the time, although especially with the inspect element method, you may need to try it several times, as additional elements and website design is making this method much harder to do successfully.
Use the Free Trial
By using the free trial of Chegg to access answers, they will be unblurred.
This is so that you can see whether Chegg’s services are what you’re looking for as well as whether Chegg actually has what they promise.
Chegg requires you to have a paid membership to access answers on their platform. But the free trial will also help you unblur Chegg answers.
After the trial period, you would need to pay to access answers on Chegg as they will reblur once the trial is over.
You will need to create an account on Chegg and the trial lasts for four weeks. This trial also enables access to the tutor system so you can pose your question directly to someone for them to answer.
Keep in mind that Chegg has ways of checking whether you’re abusing the free trial system by constantly making new accounts with Chegg, but they can’t do much about this so there’s no real harm trying if you have lots of emails or different computers to try from.
Inspect Element
While Chegg is doing a lot to make this method no longer work, with a bit of persistence this will generally be a successful way to see a blurred Chegg answer.
Once you’re confronted with a query on the Chegg questions tab along with the blurred answer, right-click the page and select the Inspect Element on your browser. Some browsers will open this same dialog via pressing F12.
If you swing your mouse cursor over the answer part, it should remove the blur.
Chegg may have used CSS properties on the element that is blurred, meaning filters are applied to answers. You can delete each element by highlighting it and then hitting the delete key on your keyboard.
If you delete something you shouldn’t have, just refresh the page and try again. You are just making local changes to the page so that it displays differently on your end, you aren’t making permanent changes to the page or deleting anything off the page permanently.
You can also uncheck the property in the Inspect Element tool via the list on the right, and this will remove the blur as well. This video does a good explanation of this.
Bots on Discord, Telegram and More
Discord is known for being a free voice, video, and text chat app that also combines a feature known as servers to help people gather around common interests and themes.
Thus there are Chegg-related Discord servers where people have integrated software which will fetch answers for your questions.
You can join as many as you want and post questions, and while a bot may instantly provide an answer, some servers rely on active users in the Discord community researching your question and getting back to you later.
So always check the rules and wait for the specified time period rather than constantly reposting the same question, as this will likely lead to you being booted from the group.
There are many alternatives to Discord that offer similar alternatives, like the app Telegram.
Generally, you’ll need to copy the link to the question you want to unblur, and paste it in the specified area. There are limitations on it depending on the way that server operates, generally, you’ll get a free answer or two upon joining, and then one every week or so.
The actual operation of how it works will generally be in a top or pinned comment or the FAQ section, so make sure you take the time to learn how it all works before blasting away with all your questions that you expect people to just answer for free.
Joining Chegg Answer Groups
While not directly unblurring the answer, if you use an answer group that is almost the same as unblurring the answer; you’ll get the contents of the unblurred page from Chegg.
Use social media to find Chegg answer groups. A simple search of any of the big social media sites should help you track these down, such as Reddit or even Quora.
Join it and then publish your question in the group. The group is filled with people who either have access to a trial membership or are a subscriber, and then they can furnish the unblurred page to you.
As these can be one step removed from seeing the actual answers on Chegg, be on the lookout for any issues regarding incorrect answers, changes or other major differences that can make all the difference between a right and wrong answer.
Mirror Sites
You’ll find a lot of the common questions and answers reproduced word-for-word, or close enough, on many competitors to Chegg. These websites may require you to sign up for an account but don’t have a monthly subscription fee like Chegg.
You can check out websites like Quizlet, Quizeplus, and Paperhelp including many others. Some of these also offer a subscription or fee for service, so just keep looking until you find one that has both the content you need and for free.
This is sometimes easier said than done, as these websites need to make money somehow, and if Chegg’s data is out there for free, then you should ask yourself whether this can be trusted or not.
How to Unblur Chegg on Mac?
Mac doesn’t differ too much from PC in unblurring Chegg answers so you can follow the above steps without much difference.
In Safari you can right-click on a webpage and select Inspect Element, with the same steps applying for Chrome, you can right-click and click Inspect.
You may need to enable the feature in Safari by opening up Preferences then going to Advanced and then put a check in the Show Develop menu in the menu bar box.
If you can see Develop between Bookmarks and Window within Safari, then the Developer Menu has already been enabled, and you can try using the Inspect feature.
Mac can also install Discord as it is supported on iOS and the other techniques mainly involve just using a search engine or similar.
Is Chegg Considered Cheating?
Before we make a decision on whether a method is cheating or not, let’s consider what cheating is, how it is policed and what the risks are of actually being caught.
Schools will all have their own definitions and examples of behavior which they consider cheating, so always check with your learning institutions policies first to find out what is going to get you in trouble or not.
Generally, if you get an undue advantage without having to go through a learning process, you’re going to be branded a cheater without much more evidence needed.
With its tailored answers to asked questions that show the entire solution, Chegg is certainly providing this.
Another common way to be found guilty of cheating is when someone engages in plagiarism. Most educational institutions will automatically fail anyone (or other sanctions) who engages in plagiarism.
As plagiarism is to steal and pass off someone else’s work as one’s own or
to use that work without crediting the source, using Chegg is easily viewable as a type of plagiarism.
Plagiarism has the double issue of being both stealing someone else’s hard work and ideas, as well as fraud via the lying by misrepresentation, or directly, when you don’t cite Chegg as the source for your work.
Chegg is a database of common questions you get in a variety of subjects and learning levels, with full and direct answers to questions that you search for. If you just copy the answers most schools are going to view this as not your original work.
This is almost certainly going to be determined that you are cheating and can suffer disciplinary action from your school, including failing that assignment or even being kicked out of the class or school altogether.
Merely copying down the reasoning and answers and submitting them as your own work is almost never going to be accepted by any good institution, but that doesn’t mean you can’t hire tutors to assist you on your homework, offer study tips or other uses.
Doing your own work and having Chegg check the answers may be in a bit of a gray area but you could likely get away with as at least you are doing most of the initial work. However, having your homework checked and corrected may land you in trouble.
Using some of Chegg’s services like Chegg Study are almost always going to result in disciplinary action. This is because you are essentially outsourcing all your coursework, assignments and other work to others.
Using Chegg Study is also meaning you’re not doing any work, meaning you can get found out in situations where you can’t access the internet, such as exams.
This means the big discrepancy in marks could result in an investigation as they suspect you of obtaining external help with your coursework.
Chegg has even been accused of cooperating in these investigations and providing evidence to the universities or other institutions who suspect a student has been ‘chegging’, that is submitting all work to Chegg to complete it for them rather than studying.
However, if you’re just using it as revision, finding learning resources, or viewing similar questions to get a feel for how an exam will turn out, there is not much that can be ascribed to you as cheating.
Chegg also has some services that are almost certainly not cheating, such as its textbook rental system that enables students to easily access digital copies of needed textbooks, for example to look up the answer they need.
It would be very difficult to say that this is cheating even under the strictest code of conduct available at a school.
Whether or not Chegg is considered cheating, another aspect you have to consider is how exactly you would get caught. If you use Chegg as a reference material to finally build up your answer or finesse a draft answer, this is going to be hard to prove.
Just copying and pasting answers straight from Chegg will leave an evidence trail, as arguments, approaches and other clues will be obvious if you just take an answer completely without being discerning.
This has caught students out in the past, as even if you get the answer right, some wrong intermediate steps can be the proverbial fingerprint found at the scene of the crime if they are shown to be taken directly from a website like Chegg.
