10 Chrome Life Hacks for IOS and Android That Everyone Should Know.
You might think of Chrome for mobile as just a miniature version of Google’s desktop browser, designed for quick web browsing while all your serious work can be done on your computer. While Chrome for desktop will likely always be more feature-rich, Chrome for mobile has its own set of powerful features worth exploring. Once you’ve gotten the hang of its cluttered home screen, you’ll discover a browser where organizing and pinning tabs is intuitive, notification blocking is simple, and every website opens in dark mode.
Use pinned tabs to keep track of important pages.
On your computer, you’re probably used to pinning tabs for quick access to important pages. For example, I always keep Gmail and Trello pinned in my default browser. This frees up the bookmarks bar and bookmark folders for organizing links. But this feature was missing from Chrome for Android and iOS until recently . If you didn’t know this was possible, it might be time to start pinning tabs on your device, especially on tablets.
Pinning tabs in Chrome on mobile is slightly different than on desktop. After opening a page, open the “Tabs” menu. Then, long-press the desired page and tap the “Pin Tab ” button. Pinned tabs will appear in a special “Pinned Tabs” section, shaped like a pill, at the bottom of the tab switching window. Tapping one will instantly take you to the pinned page. Another benefit? If you close all your tabs because they’re too busy, your pinned tabs won’t disappear.
Prevent tab overload by closing old, inactive tabs.
Safari on iPhone automatically closes tabs that are more than 30 days old . Chrome for Android has a similar feature, but it’s surprisingly limited in the iOS version.
By default, any tab you haven’t used for 21 days is automatically moved to the “Inactive Tabs” section. This section is located at the top of the Tabs page. This means that when you open the main Tabs screen, you’ll only see the tabs you’ve used recently. But just because inactive tabs are hidden doesn’t mean they’re gone. If you have hundreds of inactive tabs cluttering up your list, it’s time to close them manually. Go to the “Inactive Tabs” section, click the ” Close all inactive tabs ” button, and confirm the action in the pop-up window. Clear the list whenever it gets too long.
However, Android users have a Safari-like option to automatically close all tabs that haven’t been active for more than three months (this option is not yet available for iOS users). Go to Settings > Tabs & Tab Groups > Move to Inactive Session and ensure ” Automatically close inactive items” is enabled.
Move the Chrome address bar down.
Speaking of Safari-like features, Chrome now has the ability to move the address bar to the bottom of the screen on both Android and iPhone. This is great news for anyone who uses large phones like me. (Why Google doesn’t just make this a default feature, I’ll never understand.) To move the address bar to the bottom, simply tap and hold the address bar, then tap the ” Move address bar down” button. No more reaching around to switch to another website.
Use the Send to your devices feature to open mobile links on your computer.
If you use Chrome on both a mobile device and a computer, you can use a little-known feature to send any link from your phone to the Chrome desktop app. On your phone, tap the Share button and select Send to your devices . From the list, select the Chrome browser you want to send the link to and tap Send to your device . The next time you open Chrome, you’ll see a pop-up informing you that the page has been sent from one of your devices. Tap Open in new tab to continue reading or interacting with the website on your computer.
Block spam notifications from websites (Android only)
Spammers love to abuse Chrome’s notification system for Android. Every random website you visit wants to send you notifications, and if you tap “Allow” even once, you’ll be inundated with dozens of notifications a day. Luckily, Chrome has an option that even blocks the pop-up asking you to enable notifications for all sites. Go to Settings > Site Settings > Notifications and toggle “Don’t allow sites to send notifications.” This will prevent sites from requesting notification access and prevent them from sending you notifications. If you prefer to keep this feature enabled, you can also disable notifications for each site individually in the relevant section.
Set up your phone so picture-in-picture works on any website.
Picture-in-picture isn’t just available in YouTube and media apps. Chrome also supports it natively on both Android and iOS. This means you can play a video on any website and watch it in a small floating window, whether they have a dedicated app or not. If picture-in-picture is enabled on your phone, all you need to do is open the video and go to the home screen. (This also works with YouTube, but only if you have a YouTube Premium subscription.) On iPhone, you’ll even see a picture-in-picture button in the native video player that automatically closes the app and returns you to the home screen, where the video will continue playing in a floating window.
If Picture-in-Picture isn’t enabled, you can set it up in the Settings app. On Android, go to Apps > Special App Access > Picture-in-Picture > Chrome and enable ” Allow Picture-in-Picture .” On iPhone, go to Settings > General > Picture-in-Picture and make sure ” Launch PiP automatically” is enabled.
Use this setting to force any website to switch to dark mode.
If you use dark mode on your phone, you may be accustomed to being blinded by the lights on news websites that only offer a light theme. But there’s a simple solution: all you need to do is enable an experimental feature that forces all websites to switch to dark mode, with a black background and white text (without affecting media files or images).
Open the Chrome address bar and enter ” Chrome://flags .” Find ” dark ” at the top of the page. Under “Automatic dark mode for web content ,” select ” Enabled,” then tap the ” Relaunch ” button to restart Chrome. This works on both Android and iOS.
Lock incognito tabs when exiting Chrome
Incognito tabs are private for a reason, yet they’re just as accessible as regular tabs. Fortunately, Chrome has a feature that automatically locks incognito tabs when you exit the browser—again, this feature should be enabled by default.
On Android, go to Settings > Privacy & Security and enable “Lock Incognito Tabs When I Exit Chrome.” To activate this feature, confirm with your fingerprint or passcode. On iOS, the steps are slightly different. Go to Settings > Privacy & Security > Hide Incognito Tabs . Here, you can either hide tabs after 10 minutes or, even better, use the “Lock Immediately with Face ID” option for added security.
Remove the Discover feed and customize your start page.
Chrome’s start page can be a bit cluttered, especially on iOS. You want quick access to the address bar or search bar, but they’re often the hardest to find. Instead, you’ll see sections with your favorite sites, card-based suggestions, and, of course, the Discover feed, where Google shows you all the articles you might be interested in.
Luckily, this start page is customizable, and you can disable all three sections to keep things looking neat and simple. Click “Edit” in the top left corner of the new tab page and disable each feature you no longer want to use. Once all features are disabled (and you’ve switched to a more neutral background), you’ll likely find the new tab page much more user-friendly.
Join the beta testing to be the first to test new features.
If you enjoy staying up-to-date on the latest tech news, you can test new Chrome features before they’re released to others, whether you’re using an iPhone or Android. On iOS, it’s as easy as installing the Google Chrome beta from the TestFlight app . If you already have the app installed, the beta will replace the stable version. On Android, visit the Google Chrome beta testing site , sign in with the Google Play account you use on your smartphone, and select “Become a tester.” After signing up, you’ll receive a Chrome update that will switch you to the latest beta version. If you’d like to leave the program and return to the stable version, return to the same site and use the “Leave Program” button .