Summary
Google already rolled out a redesign for the Chrome browser earlier this year, taking inspiration from the company’s Material You design language and improving customization. The address bar received a few changes along with the redesign, and now Google is announcing a few additional features that are now rolling out for Chrome’s address bar.
Google Chrome’s address bar now shows autocomplete results based on any word you’ve previously used to search for a website. For example, if you previously searched for “flights” and ended up on the Google Flights homepage, starting to type “flights” in the address bar will show the Google Flights page in addition to regular search autocomplete. That can be useful if you don’t exactly remember the website you landed on after a previous web search. Google says the feature only works on desktop Chrome right now, not the iPhone and Android apps.
The address bar will also now suggest popular websites based on your search as you type, such as showing a direct link to the Google Earth website after you start typing “google search.” Just like with the previous search autocomplete feature, this might save you a click compared to using web search normally. The site suggestion feature is available on all platforms.
Google Chrome’s bookmark search is also getting an upgrade. You could already search for bookmarks from the address bar, but the autocomplete results were based on the name of the bookmark, and not its parent folder or the rest of the hierarchy. That has now been addressed, making bookmark search even more useful. It works on both desktop and mobile Chrome, too.
Finally, Google Chrome will try to detect misspelled URLs in the address bar as you type them, and show autocomplete suggestions based on your previously visited websites. This is actually thethirdtime Google has announced this feature. It wasfirst revealedas an accessibility feature (since it can be helpful for people with dyslexia) on Global Accessibility Awareness Day back in May, then the companyhighlighted it againin a roundup of accessibility features yesterday.
The new features don’t appear to be tied to a specific version of Chrome, so if you don’t have them already, you should get them soon through a server-side rollout.
