Google Chrome recently deployed a new update dubbed the “Chrome Refresh 2023”. Amongst various improvements and enhancements, Google – once again – decides what’s best for the user and forces a Windows 7-esq blue color across its entire browser.
What your browser will look like once you restart and get the forced 2023 update.
How To Disable The Blue Color From Chrome's Address Bar and Window
- Type chrome://flags on your Google Chrome’s address bar and hit enter.
- Search for and disable the following flags:
- Chrome Refresh 2023
- Chrome WebUI Refresh 2023
- Omnibox Steady State Background Color
3. Hit the blue “Relaunch” at the bottom right corner of your browser for the changes to take effect.
Your chrome://flags window should look like this once you’ve disabled all 3 flags:
All 3 of these flags must be disabled to restore Chrome to its former glory.
Once the flags have been disabled your Google Chrome browser will return to its familiar look, leaving the address bar and window grey, neutral, and not distracting.
As an added bonus, the change will be synced across all Google Chrome browsers that are logged in to the same account, so you only have to do this once per user.
No thanks, Google, life is distracting enough. Sedated greys restored.
4 Comments
Even after doing this, the background color of the search bar still looks pink in incognito mode.
https://i.imgur.com/iigjQKR.png
Thank you for this solution, worked immediately for me and saved my sanity!
Thanks a lot! I really don’t like that color, and now i can have True Blue instead of bluish-black. I really hated that color. It worked though!
Today is May 17, 2024, and for some reason the Omnibox Steady State Background Color option isn’t available for me to disable it. Only theOmnibox Steady State Icons, Omnibox Steady State Height, Omnibox Steady State Text Color, Omnibox Steady State Text Style are AVAILABLE TO BE DISABLE. Now I was able to disable the Chrome Refresh 2023 & Chrome WebUI Refresh 2023, but it is STILL NOT CHANGING BACK TO THE OLD VERSION OF GOOGLE CHROME. I was working on my laptop today and out of nowhere it updated to the newer version of google chrome. Now I have this distracting light blue color at the top and everything is in a bubbly like square box on my drop downs and I hate it. Is this the permanent look for google chrome or is there another way to change it back to the older version?