Summary
- Chrome for Android was recently testing extension support, part of a larger effort called “Desktop Android”.
- Now, there’s a new “Appearance” section in the Canary release that brings basic options for themes and toolbar shortcuts in one place.
- A dedicated appearance section suggests the potential for more appearance-related options to join the list.
Chrome for Android is trying to become more like the desktop version of Chrome every day. Around the end of 2024, Google started to test extension support for Android Chrome — something that competing browsers such as Firefox and Samsung Internet have offered for a while. The extension support effort was part of a larger effort, internally called “Desktop Android”, that, as the name suggests, aimed to bring some of desktop Android’s best features to Chrome for Android.
Related
While the extension support feature was aimed at Chromebooks, Google is now adding a desktop Chrome feature to Chrome for Android in the Canary release on smartphones, according to Chrome Story (via 9to5Google). There’s a new dedicated Appearance option with two pages: Theme and Toolbar shortcut. Both of these pages were already available in other menus, so the change here is mainly coupling them together on a new page dedicated to the browser’s appearance. The change also points towards Chrome for Android taking appearance more seriously now and potentially moving more related pages to this option or adding new ones.
Pretty barebones at the moment
The Appearance section is live in Chrome 136 for Android, which is the latest Canary release. However, the menu is still locked behind a feature flag. You can enable it by copying and pasting the following link:
chrome://flags/#android-appearance-settings
Still, this early version looks pretty barebones, only featuring two of the most used appearance-related options. The Theme page lists three options: System Default, Light, and Dark. System Default means dark mode will be enabled when the device’s dark mode or battery saver is on. The Toolbar shortcut page allows you to customize the extra icons on Chrome’s toolbar. Some options include opening a new tab, sharing a page, adding a page to bookmarks, and so on.
Creating a dedicated page to appearance makes us believe there’s more coming. Let’s see if new options join the list. Or maybe it’s simply an effort to bring all the appearance-related pages into one place, and nothing more.