Material You who? Chrome for Android could get its own color theming

Ever since the rollout of Google’s Material You theme a few years ago, Chrome has been among the apps that seamlessly adapt to the system-wide color palette. However, with upcoming versions, Google may enable the option to apply a distinct color theme to Chrome on Android, separate from the device’s color scheme.

This feature is being tested in Chrome Canary, the alpha branch of Chrome, where new features are released before they arrive on the beta or stable versions. Reddit user Leopeva64-2 demonstrated that the option to set a separate theme for Chrome appears in the Appearance section of Chrome Canary. Leopeva64 also posted the demo video on X, and the following screenshots were sourced from it.

As seen in the screenshots above, the Appearance option is accessible by tapping the Customize button in the top left corner of the screen. Notably, the Appearance option has been under testing in Canary for a few months now, although it has not been available to everyone, even in Canary.

A new option for “Chrome Colors” now shows up after tapping the Appearance option in the customization menu. Tapping the option opens up another menu to choose the color palette specific to Chrome. We’re unsure whether the same method will be used to set different colors to Chrome when — and if — it arrives on the stable and beta channels.

Currently, there are only two color options, and more colors can be expected in the coming updates.

In addition to the option to apply a specific color theme to Chrome, Google is also testing the option for using different colors for different tab groups — just like Chrome on desktop. This feature is also being tested in Canary, alongside the option to apply a custom image as a background.

These changes are evidently part of an app-wide visual overhaul in Chrome on Android, and follow the recent addition of Material 3 Expressive elements to the stable version of the browser.