If you use Chrome on a Mac you might be interested to know that there is now a dark mode that you can use in Mojave.
Some reports suggest that the Google Chrome Dark Mode arrived in the Chrome Canary update for macOS – that’s version 72 of Chrome. While we haven’t been able to get Dark Mode to work in such a way as it only defaults to coming on when we have Dark Mode selected on our Mac, you will be able to get a completely black version of the browser by following this guide.
(If you aren’t sure how to use Dark Mode on a Mac read our guide here).
To turn your Chrome browser dark you can select the Just Black skin from the Chrome Themes Page in the Chrome Web Store here.
You will be able to choose from 14 new colour palettes for Chrome that include Just Black, which is essentially a Dark Mode. The Just Black skin will turn the menu bar black.
- Find the Just Black skin.
- Click on “Add to Chrome.”
There are other colour palettes to choose from including “Black and White,” which turns the search bar and your currently open tab light while all the other open tabs will be dark.
However, if you want to have a true Dark Mode that becomes the default when Mojave’s Dark Mode is on, you will have to wait a little longer, or follow the advice below.
- Download Chromium (the open source developer version of Chrome). You can download that from here.
- Once downloaded and installed, move Chromium into your Applications folder.
- If you want Chrome to use Dark Mode when you have Dark Mode selected for macOS type the following into Terminal: /Applications/Chromium.app/Contents/MacOS/Chromium –enable-feature=DarkMode
- If you always want to see Chrome in Dark Mode type: /Applications/Chromium.app/Contents/MacOS/Chromium —force-dark-mode
If you typed in the first chunk of code you should find that when you have turned on Dark Mode on your Mac Chrome will mimic the same darker interface.
To turn on Dark Mode in MacOS opening System Preferences:
- Click on General.
- Click on Dark.
Author: Karen Haslam, Editor
Macworld editor since 2008, Karen has worked on both sides of the Apple divide, clocking up a number of years at Apple's PR agency prior to joining Macworld almost two decades ago.
Karen's career highlights include interviewing Apple's Steve Wozniak and discussing Steve Jobs’ legacy on the BBC. Her focus is Mac, but she lives and breathes Apple.