edit chrome experimental

Chrome is getting 3 new generative AI features

Jan 23, 2024

[[read-time]] min read

Turn on these experimental AI features to organize your tabs, create custom themes and get help with writing on the web.

Over the last few years, we’ve brought the latest machine learning and AI technologies into Chrome to make searching the web easier, safer and more accessible. We started with improving practical, everyday tasks, like helping you add real-time captions to videos, better detect malicious sites , manage permission prompts and generate the key points of a webpage .

Starting with today’s release of Chrome (M121), we're introducing experimental generative AI features to make it even easier and more efficient to browse — all while keeping your experience personalized to you.

You’ll be able to try out these new features in Chrome on Macs and Windows PCs over the next few days, starting in the U.S. Just sign into Chrome, select “Settings” from the three-dot menu and navigate to the “ Experimental AI ” page. Because these features are early public experiments, they’ll be disabled for enterprise and educational accounts for now.

Smartly organize your tabs

Tab groups are a helpful way to manage lots of tabs, but curating them can be a pretty manual process. With a new tab organizer feature, Chrome will automatically suggest and create tab groups based on your open tabs. This can be particularly helpful if you’re working on several tasks in Chrome at the same time, like planning a trip, researching a topic and shopping. To use this feature, right-click on a tab and select “ Organize Similar Tabs ” or click the drop-down arrow to the left of your tabs. Chrome will even suggest names and emoji for these new groups so you can easily find them again when you need them next.

Create your own themes with AI

Last year, we introduced generative AI wallpapers with Android 14 and Pixel 8 devices. Now we’re bringing that same text-to-image diffusion model to Chrome so you can personalize your browser even more. You’ll be able to quickly generate custom themes based on a subject, mood, visual style and color that you choose — no need to become an AI prompt expert! To get started, visit the “ Customize Chrome ” side panel, click “Change theme” and then “Create with AI.” For example, maybe you’re enamored with the “aurora borealis” and want to see it in an “animated” style with a “serene” mood. Just select those options to see what Chrome comes up with. For more inspiration, check out this collection of the Chrome team’s favorite theme creations.

Quick reminder: In addition to AI-generated themes, you can also customize Chrome with photos you’ve uploaded or themes from our collections in the Chrome Web Store, including ones commissioned from a growing community of artists .

Get help drafting things on the web

Writing on the web can be daunting, especially if you want to articulate your thoughts on public spaces or forums. So in next month's Chrome release, we’ll launch another experimental AI-powered feature to help you write with more confidence on the web — whether you want to leave a well-written review for a restaurant, craft a friendly RSVP for a party or make a formal inquiry about an apartment rental. To get started, right-click a text box or field on any site you visit in Chrome and select “Help me write.” Type in a few words and our AI will kickstart the writing process for you.

Look out for more ways we’re bringing AI and ML into Chrome this year, including integrating our new AI model Gemini , to help you browse even easier and faster.

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Make permanent changes to web pages with Chrome's Overrides Dev Tool

Local Overrides is a relatively new experimental feature of the Developer Tools of the Google Chrome web browser that you may use to make permanent changes to web pages similar to how you'd do so using userscripts or userstyles.

While most users may not want to modify style or other content on web pages they visit regularly; some users want to do so to remove annoyances, improve usability or make other modifications.

A good example is a site that is too bright in the eyes of the user. Using overrides, you could change the style of the website to a dark one so that it is more eye-pleasing. You can also use it to increase or decrease font sizes, change fonts, remove background images, or manipulate any other element on the page.

Setting up Local Overrides in Google Chrome

Local Overrides is an experimental feature of Google Chrome that is available in all supported versions of the browser.

Here is what you need to do to enable it:

Tap on F12 to bring up the Developer Tools interface.
Tap on F1 in the interface to open the Preferences.
Under Preferences, locate "Enable Local Overrides" and check the option.
Visit a web page that you want to make permanent changes on.
Switch to the Sources panel in the Developer Tools.
Click on the icon with the two arrows pointing to the right, and select Overrides from the menu.
Select "setup overrides" and pick a local folder that you want to store the overrides in.
Accept Chrome's request to access the folder.

Using Local Overrides in Google Chrome

Using overrides for resources is pretty straightforward. Open the Network panel in the browser to get started. If you don't see any loaded files reload the page to populate the listing.

Right-click on any resource file that you want to override and select the "save as override" option. Chrome saves the data to the local system and will use it instead of the original resource when it loads the web page.

You may edit the file then under Sources > Overrides. This works well for styles, but you can override pretty much any source file including HTML pages and JavaScript files.

Overrides are saved automatically, and you may delete them from the overrides listing in the Chrome Developer Tools, or use the preferences instead.

The overrides section of the Developer Tools preferences list all sites with overrides. When you hover over an entry, you may delete it to remove all overrides or click on edit to change the domain name.

Check out the following instructional video that highlights how you may use the feature to improve the performance of web pages.

Closing Words

Local Overrides is an experimental feature which means that Google may pull it in the future or integrate it fully in the browser. For now, it is an excellent option to change the style or code of web pages that you visit regularly and an alternative to using userstyles or scripts for that.

The main advantage of the built-in option is that you can use Chrome's Developer Tools to see the changes in realtime without having to save external files manually and reload pages each time you make changes.

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Can I apply these overrides in such a way that I wouldn’t have to open dev tools every time to get these activated on a web site?

Can I use local overrides to fix your grammatical errors? You missed the “V” in visit. You also confused your left and your right. The arrows point to the right my dude. Cheers.

I thought this Local Overrides feature came in the nick of time because Stylebot has become abandonware.

Two kinks to becoming a true userstyle alternative:

1) Can’t have global styles. I need them for slick scrollbars, no focus outline, etc.

2) Versioned files. If you have style.css?v=1231414245859 then you’re out of luck, it won’t work the second time.

Hey Martin, the option “Override requests with workspace project” appears to have been renamed to “Enable local overrides” and it has been moved to Settings->Preferences->Persistence. I’m currently running Chrome 66 Stable.

Thank you, I have updated the guide.

Great article, but how do you make permanent changes that exist for all users/after the page has been refreshed.

Such a pity google will not allow the user to change chromes interface like in firefox.

Element Hiding Helper voor Adblock Plus does the same in FireFox and it’s the only option I use of ABP with the use of personal filters for sites. The auto list slows down surfing.

UBlock Origin allows one to do some useful things to web pages too. If a page has an add you don’t want to see, just snip it out using right-click and pick block element. Lots of opportunity here.

Sounds like a dream come true especially because it doesn’t require installing a separate extension. However I’ll be cautious since, as stated in this article, Local Overrides is an experimental feature which Google may pull in the future

Interesting. I would really LOVE to see the same in Firefox. Since in recent times, Firefox mimics Chrome in a lot of areas, I have some hope…

I feel like I’ve wandered into some kind of alternate universe where Mozilla is dumbing down Firefox and Google is adding cool new features to Chrome. ;)

Thanks Martin! I’ll definitely be playing with the dev tools more in Chrome.

That alternate universe doesn’t exist as Firefox is not getting “dumbed down”, whatever that means.

@Jessica If last week, in Nightly, I could go to the Privacy & Security page and delete individual 1st-party cookies for a website and this week I can not, then that is in my opinion “dumbed down”. I haven’t looked at every website but it looks to me like a lot of websites use multiple 1st-party cookies. A lot of sites use 3-8 1st-party cookies. I don’t often need to delete just some of a websites cookies but over the years I have needed to, many times, for short time periods. The last couple months I’ve been deleting all but one YouTube cookie (PREF) to keep the old UI layout. Yes, I know that the dev tools can be used to do that, as long as you open the dev tools on that specific website. And you can also use the site info button on the URL bar if you are on the right website or it takes 5 clicks to get to where you can see all of the cookies for all of the websites. You might think one of those options is better than the preferences pages but i do not. You can even bookmark “chrome://****/****/****/****.xul” but then how many people even know what that bookmark actually is?

After I don’t know how many years, the ability to adjust the browser cache size, or to see what the auto cache size is, also went away with the new site data, cookie and cache preferences. Dumbing down?

It’s not like I’m a Chrome fanboy looking for an excuse to bash Firefox. My primary browser has been FF based for 10 years. The last 1.5 yrs with Firefox then Pale Moon for many yrs before that and then FF again before that. If anything I am very much a FF fanboy but if I don’t like something I’m not going to be bashful. Sometimes, maybe too often, tolerance ends up being weakness. If we don’t like something we need to speak up. Or… we can be little mices. :)

Which desktop browsers do not have individual 1st-party cookie management accessible in their Settings/Options?

Firefox totally dumbed down. Copied an inferior Chrome extension engine. Now it’s just a Chrome copycat with big marketing budget. It’s no longer a privacy browser either. Cliq, telemetry, mr. robot, pocket, etc. Need I say more?

My thoughts exactly!

I look forward to this function when it trickles down to Chrome beta, if it ever does.

Sorry, my mistake. I got the flags flipped in Dev and Stable but was only able to (Switch to the Experiments tab and check “Override requests with workspace project”.) in Stable but not Dev.

I just enabled it in both Chrome Stable and Chrome Dev.

Load â€” chrome://flags/#enable-devtools-experiments â€” in the browser’s address bar and switch the flag to enabled.

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Home Web How To Enable And Use Chrome Experimental Features

How To Enable And Use Chrome Experimental Features

We’re all familiar with Google Chrome. It’s one of the most popular browsers on the ‘net and easily one of the best (aside from a few small complaints). Depending on how long you’ve used Chrome, you probably know it like the back of your hand. However, there’s one thing that you might not be familiar with, as it’s not necessarily “easy” to access — Chrome’s built-in experimental features.

Google has actually integrated a ton of experimental features into Chrome which bring, well, some experimental features to the forefront you can use. They can make Chrome more efficient, add new features, and so on. Follow along below, and we’ll show you how to get things setup.

Should you use experimental Chrome features?

So, the question is, should you actually use the experimental features found in Google Chrome? There really isn’t any harm in it — your PC will always be fine, but you may lose your data. Again, they are “experimental” features, meaning they could be buggy or slow down your browser, and possibly delete everything you have — accounts, bookmarks, history, important plugins, folders, etc). That’s not always the case — a lot of the times a buggy experimental feature can easily be fixed. If things start to appear like they’re dragging, it’s (most of the time) as easy as going back into the experimental features section and turning the feature off that is causing the problem. So, as long as you’re willing to tinker around with the features and can risk losing the data in your browser, there’s not too much harm in turning experimental features on.

What about browser backups?

If you want to take experimental features for a spin, but don’t want to take the risk of losing any data, that can easily be resolved by backing up your data with Google’s servers. It’s as easy as logging into Chrome with your Google account (usually found under Settings) and enabling “Sync Everything.” This will sync all of your Google Chrome data (and Chrome OS) with Google’s servers. That way, it’s easily retrievable, allowing you to easily restore your browser to your original settings.

You can find “Sync Everything” under Settings > Sync Settings, as pictured above. Make sure that you have the “Sync Everything” slider turned on. It’ll look blue if it’s enabled, or gray if it’s disabled.

To restore to your original settings, it’s as easy as logging into Chrome again. So, if you turn on an experimental feature, it breaks Chrome, and you have to reinstall, it’s as easy as going back into Settings and logging into your Google account. This will restore your Chrome backup.

Some other general information

One thing to remember before you start using experimental features is that they can be taken away in the blink of an eye — these are features that Google is testing for consumer use in Chrome and Chrome OS. If Google decides that one feature just isn’t working the way they wanted to, you could see it disappear from the list of experimental features available to you. Likewise, you’ll also periodically see new experimental features become available in that list to try.

It’s also worth noting that a lot of these experimental features are back-end features, meaning they work to make the overall user experience faster and more efficient. So, you won’t always see features that you can physically use, but that you can turn on for a more overall seamless Chrome experience.

With all of that out of the way, let’s get started!

How to enable experimental features in Chrome

Google’s experimental features are easy to access. Whether you’re running Chrome OS or Google Chrome, it’s as easy as opening the browser and entering chrome://flags into the address bar and pressing “Enter.” You should arrive at a page similar to the one shown above.

There’s no specific button you have to press — it’s as simple as going through the list of experimental features, reading what they do, and pressing the “Enable” or “Disable” button, depending on what you want to do with that specific feature.

What experimental features to use

There are a ton of experimental features that you can take for a spin, although some of the descriptions might sound a little confusing as to what they do. We’ve broken down a small sampling of the features below to show you what they do, giving you a better idea of what you’re tinkering around with.

#ignore-gpu-blacklist

This is a software rendering feature that aims to enable GPU acceleration on unsupported configurations. So, it’ll override Chrome’s built-in software rendering list, and instead use your hardware to provide a more overall seamless experience. Obviously this is a back-end feature, trying to increase the overall performance of Chrome; however, right now it appears that it’s a hit or miss with the hardware acceleration being unavailable in many cases.

#enable-scroll-prediction

This is another neat rendering feature to make your Chrome experience a little more seamless. Basically, it predicts where your finger is going to be next so that it can render that portion of the page before you actually arrive there — that way, when you’re ready to view that portion of content, there should be little to know waiting for something to load or “render.”

#smooth-scrolling

Smooth scrolling, so far, is probably the coolest feature. This helps the user smoothly scroll from the top to the bottom of a web page in Chrome, even when your system might be bogging down or struggling to free up resources (i.e. in the case of a full hard drive or lack of memory).

#ash-enable-night-light

We’ve told you before about programs that’ll help you work in the dark, making the screen emit a “warmer” light at night to make things easier on the eyes. One of the features Google is working on for Chrome (for all support operating systems) is something called Night Light, which operates similarly to programs like f.lux. With it enabled, you’ll be able to control the temperature of the screen within Chrome.

#quick-unlock-fingerprint

If you have a Chromebook, this is a neat feature. It’ll allow you to unlock your Chromebook with a fingerprint on the lock screen. Alternatively, there’s another experimental feature that uses a PIN to unlock it.

#print-pdf-as-image

This is another super handy experimental feature that’ll hopefully make it into a full update. It does just as it says, allowing you to print a PDF as an image in Print Preview. This is handy, as sometimes it’s just easier to print a PDF as an image, and some printers out there won’t let you print PDFs, but they will let you print images. This makes that conversion process a little easier. This experimental feature is available in the Chrome browser for all operating systems as well as Chrome OS.

#enable-tablet-splitview

Finally, the last feature we’ll highlight is Split View. This is Chrome OS-specific, allowing you to play or tinker around with using two apps at once in a split view. Again, it’s experimental — a little buggy in our testing — but could be a cool feature for a final update to increase multitasking capabilities.

There’s plenty more experimental features available in Chrome. As a reminder, type in Chrome://flags in the address bar to check them out for yourself.

What about the beta channel?

Maybe you don’t want to mess around with experimental features, risking all of your browser data. Or maybe you don’t want to deal with a possible corrupted Chrome client, having to uninstall and reinstall again. But, you still want to tinker with all of the new goodies. Luckily, you can still do that without risking the integrity of your main client — instead, you can download the beta channel.

Google Chrome Beta is a separate client, allowing you to take all of the latest up and coming Chrome features for a test drive. You’ll be able to provide direct feedback to Google on those features as well. It’s honestly the best way to test Chrome’s new features, instead of putting your daily browser at risk.

You can download it for free from Google over at www.google.com/chrome/browser/beta .

And that’s all there is to it! If you like to tinker with new software, Chrome’s experimental features are a great place to start. There’s little risk of “losing all your data,” if you have it backed up and synced into your Google account. And even if you don’t want to mess with these features in the main Chrome client, you can always go and download the Chrome Beta Channel as a separate client, allowing you to still tinker with the new features and enhancements coming down the pipeline.

And keep in mind, Chrome isn’t the only browser you can tinker with, plenty other mainstream browsers off beta features you can mess with as well — Firefox , Opera , Vivaldi, etc.

If you have any feedback or need help getting an experimental feature going, be sure to leave us a comment in the comments section below!

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