Google Testing Chrome Redesign With Early Adopters

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Screenshot: Francois Beaufort

Google is introducing its Material Design aesthetic in Chrome and Chrome OS in the latest Canary build, including tab shape, omnibox suggestion icons, tab strip coloring, pinned tab and alert indicators. It’s primarily coming to Linux, Windows and Chrome OS, but there’s also a way to enable it for macOS.

The news comes from a post on Google Plus, in which Google evangelist Francois Beaufort wrote noted that it’s still in development and can be buggy.

The new Material Design UI will update in the Canary channel on Chrome OS, Linux and Windows by default. Mac OS updates, however, require some toggling to see the Material Design refresh.

According to Beaufort, users can set up experimental flags in Canary on Mac to enable the new design, They should go to chrome://flags/#top-chrome-md to "Refresh" and enable chrome://flags/#views-browser-windows.

Rolling out the Material Design UI refresh on the bleeding-edge Canary channel means just early adopters, those willing to deal with bugs and developers will see it for now. As various design elements are being tested on a release channel, stability could be an issue. Hopefully the new build will stand up to Canary testing, and we will see a new and improved UI very soon.

Leah Heilbrunn
7 Comments Comment from the forums
  • lorfa
    Fixing more things that aren't broken ; (
    Reply
  • bobba84
    Camp as a row of tents.
    Reply
  • salgado18
    Is it only me, or the new design is uglier? What's wrong with today's designers? :(
    Reply
  • Non-Euclidean
    Lots of things

    1) Lack of originality. They can't think for themselves. They end up copying from a company regarded as having good style, Apple. The only problem is that when Apple went Material Design (a/k/a) Moronic Design it was boring, bland and 2 dimensional. But that didn't stop the lemmings from jumping off the same cliff. MS followed with the hideous tile interface that they are still forcing on people in Windows 10. I don't know what the rest of the world thinks is attractive, but to me it sure isn't stupid monochromatic squares everywhere.

    2) Lack of taste. This is exemplified by Material Design.

    3) Lack of willpower. Not having the will to do something different, something that isn't derivative.
    Reply
  • techy1966
    So does this mean if Google changes Chrome again on how it looks that Firefox will follow suit and do the same since that is what they did last time Google changed things up and yes I use Firefox so not being a Chrome fanboy I like firefox over Chrome personally it is a bit faster than Chrome. Well it used to be before Firefox Quantum that is.
    Reply
  • eye4bear
    Am I the only one that thinks this looks almost exactly like Firefox?
    Reply
  • eye4bear
    Is it just me or do the new tab shape look exactly like Firefox? Currently it is very easy to tell if someone is using Chrome do to the different shape tabs. Now Chrome will just look like the other browsers. How sad.
    Reply