Google is introducing its Material Design aesthetic in Chrome and Chrome OS in the latest Canary build, including tab shape, omnibox suggestion icons, tab strip coloring, pinned tab and alert indicators. It’s primarily coming to Linux, Windows and Chrome OS, but there’s also a way to enable it for macOS.
The news comes from a post on Google Plus, in which Google evangelist Francois Beaufort wrote noted that it’s still in development and can be buggy.
The new Material Design UI will update in the Canary channel on Chrome OS, Linux and Windows by default. Mac OS updates, however, require some toggling to see the Material Design refresh.
According to Beaufort, users can set up experimental flags in Canary on Mac to enable the new design, They should go to chrome://flags/#top-chrome-md to “Refresh” and enable chrome://flags/#views-browser-windows.
Rolling out the Material Design UI refresh on the bleeding-edge Canary channel means just early adopters, those willing to deal with bugs and developers will see it for now. As various design elements are being tested on a release channel, stability could be an issue. Hopefully the new build will stand up to Canary testing, and we will see a new and improved UI very soon.