After rolling out updates to Chrome for Windows earlier this week, Google is now rolling out an update to Chrome for Android. The Chrome 62 for Android brings new revamped Chrome U.I, HTTP warnings, Oreo notification channels and much more.
The new update brings a fresh new design for the Chrome U.I. After being in the testing phase and then the V62 moved to chrome beta. The main difference with the new chrome U.I is that everything is now rounded including the address bar and the New Tab Page cards/shortcuts. Matching with the Android 8.0 Oreo style interface. Google is gradually rolling out the bottom address bar redesign for Chrome which is known as the ‘Chrome Home’.
In the meantime it is including new changes and modern day U.I for chrome, the tab manager now has a light background, and the bottom navigation bar no longer has labels. If you still don’t have new Home UI yet, you can go to chrome://flags, search for ‘Chrome Home’, select Enabled and restart Chrome to get the new UI.
The overflow menu which earlier had bookmarks, downloads, history are no longer available. Instead, they can be found as tabs on the New Tab Page. Further, Google will now warn you as ‘Not Secure’ to any HTTP site where any user data is entered. In the incognito mode, Google will show a Not Secure warning to every HTTP site as the privacy of the user is at stake in this mode especially.
Meanwhile, Chrome 62 on Android 8.0 Oreo will have notification channels for sites that send notifications. Google has also introduced new API for web apps in Chrome 62 called as the Network Information API, and just as the name suggests, it gives access to sites to view information about your device’s network connection like 3G, 4G, WiFi, round-trip delay time, and maximum download link. This will undoubtedly be helpful for sites who are aiming to minimize the loading times, and if your network is slow, the website tries to load the lightweight version instead.
Other features include Media Capture API which lets developers use the new captureStream() function to record video and audio from specific parts of web pages. It now supports OpenType variable fonts and enables the Ambient Light Sensor API by default which will allow sites to adopt the changes in light intensity.
Though Google will roll out the Chrome 62 update in the coming days, you can download and sideload the APK from here, before it starts rolling out through Google Play.