Google is celebrating Chrome’s 10th anniversary by launching a new update which brings the elements of Material design onboard the most used browser in the world. Google informed that the version 69 of Google Chrome for desktop, iOS, Android, Windows, Mac and Linux comes with new features alongside the revamped design. The search giant said that now Chrome has more rounded shapes, new icons and a new light colour palette. Google Chrome will offer better security features combined with better password management, improved autofill and a faster and smarter Omnibox.
Chrome 69 for Android and iOS - New Design and New Features
With this new update, the Chrome Android version gets updated to 69.0.3497.76 and along with it comes a more minimalistic and rounded Material design. Apart from that, Google has also introduced many improvements like secure and easy mobile payments via third-party apps, support for password generation on more sites, and general stability and performance improvements. Also, the grey background has been replaced by the white palette. Every tab and bar in the new Chrome gets a much more rounded design, and the Omnibox has also been made pill shaped as per the Material design theme.
According to Google, the search is now faster and smarter in the Omnibox as now the results will be displayed in the suggestions itself, and if the user opens a site which is already open in another tab then Chrome will prompt the user to jump to that tab via a “Switch to tab” button. For the phones, the new Chrome will take up the entire screen area as the support for notch has also been included. There is a revamped new tab design with a horizontal page switcher. The Chrome 69 for iOS also brings these changes on board, but on iPhones, users will find the toolbar located towards the bottom of the screen.
Chrome Desktop Material Theme
On the desktop also, Chrome 69 takes a full-fledged Material design as we get to see lighter shades and rounded tabs and bars. There is also a new revamped new tab design which users will be able to customise to their liking. There is also an avatar added to the upper right side near the menu which will allow the users to quickly access their account related details like passwords or payment info. The Chrome 69 for desktop has also enabled the PiP mode by default. After this new update, it will be mandatory for the websites to ask for permission to use Flash after every browser restart. For users who wish to update to the new Chrome, can do so by downloading it from the link or updating it using the built-in updater.
New Features of Chrome 69
The new Chrome will allow more customisations like enabling shortcut creation and management from the new tab page. The new tab page can also be personalised now with a background of your choice. Other notable features include improved autofill that accurately remembers and fills in your passwords, addresses, and credit card numbers. The Chrome toolbar will now allow you to access this information easily which is otherwise stored in your Google account. There is also an improved password management system wherein it will generate a new secure password for you and will save it for future use so that you don’t have to worry about remembering multiple passwords. These auto-generated passwords will also be varying for different sites to maintain security.
Apart from these apparent changes, on the backend, the new Chrome comes with improved startup time, latency, usage of memory, and usability. New CSS features to enhanced performance tracking ability have also been introduced for developers.
