You can no longer disable material design in Chrome’s browser starting from version 55. Recently Google has made material design the default UI for Chrome – first on Mac with version 52 and next on Windows for Chrome 53. Users who’ve not liked the new design can disable Material design and revert to old UI temporarily by using the Material Design in the browser’s top Chrome flag, which had not lasted for long, Chromium team has removed it.
READ: Chrome 52: Mac gets Material design, Windows to get with Chrome 53
Material Design in the browser’s top Chrome flag removed
This change has been spotted on Chrome dev, expect it to roll out to Chrome 55 stable, which could arrive in a couple of months from now. We advise you to get used to the new design rather than blaming Google or stick with older versions of Chrome instead, which could be a bad decision as you not only miss the new features, but also the security fixes as well.
Thanks to Hamuko.
I blame Google all the way. They are the ones that force us to use this eye cancer named “Material Design”. Back then they bought nice software like Picasa and made it free for everyone, now they only suspend great software way too often and make their current software like Chrome totally crap with every update.
Time to move back to Firefox I guess. :-(
This is horrible.
It’s terrible. I’ll stick to Safari henceforth.
Google is forcing us to like what “they” think is appealing. I HATE material design. Removing the option to disable it really annoying.
I totally agree with you, although if you use Chrome OS, you can totally enhance your material design experience to actually make it look nice. What you do is that you select experimental Chrome OS system UI elements. Also, enable material design settings, extensions, feedback, and policy. If you use a Chromebook, I hope you greatly enjoy these flags. If not, use the flags except the system UI flag.
Wow. Just restarted the PC for windows update, and next thing you know, the previously disabled Material Design in Chrome just enables itself. After much sweat, blood and tears, turns out you can’t change it anymore!
55 came, and they removed the non-material design. On Windows, with “medium fonts”, the tab bar is, well, pretty bad. I’ll probably switch to FF – while not great, it can still be customized…
Google — you can have any design you want. Just LEAVE THE OPTION to disable it. Not everyone will like what you like! And to make the icons smaller, with less contrast, making the UI harder to navigate — how will that help all the older folks or the people with low vision?? PLEASE PUT BACK THE OPTION TO DISABLE MATERIAL DESIGN. That way you can please a greater number of people.
Google, this is bad. I’m switching to FireFox. Don’t expect me to come back until you fix this. I’m on a PC, not a MOBILE DEVICE. I expect my browser to not look like a shitty mobile phone app.
I have been a die-hard Google fan for many years. I cannot stand the new material design and the fact that Google took away my ability to disable it. It’s been years since I’ve used FireFox but that will change this evening. Seeya Chrome.
There’s almost no force as powerful as the urge to screw up something that was perfectly fine by making it “more elegant”–and then lock in those changes, whether people want it or not. iOS, Firefox, Chrome, Windows–they’ve all gotten uglier and less ergonomic as the hot new design teams makes a name for themselves. Yuck.
I can’t stand the dark tabs on the newest version and I hate that I can’t change it back again. It hurts my eyes to even look at this. Why was this made mandatory?!
Google get some new design people! Get rid of the material design, too many customers hate it!
Now that I’m forced to use a design that had no (apparent) reason to exist, chrome no-longer feels like home. It’s like when you get paranoid over your house being an exact replica of your actual house. I hate it. It wastes too much space. And if it’s not broken, DON’T FIX IT. And better yet, DON’T FORCE PEOPLE WHO HATE IT TO USE IT!!! I really HATE the straight lines, the not-friendly/not-puffy icons, and the optimisations for touch screen even though I DON’T EVEN HAVE A TOUCHSCREEN!
What gives, Google? You turned my home into an unfriendly, optimised-for-a-wrong-device, UGLY version of the perfect & beautiful UI that you already had!
I REALLY HATE GOOGLE CHROME MATERIAL DESIGN! Whenever there is a new chrome update in windows they enabled material design. Previously I was successful in turning material design off! But with version 55 of chrome this is not posssible anymore! I HATE THAT!
Also with material design the URL fonts are too small !!!! I want old design back!
Does Google employ any designers over the age of 40? How about anyone who is sight-impaired? Material Design is too dark, washed out, and compact for anyone my age or without near perfect vision to use. Ugly I can stand, but this is unusable. Shame on Google!
The font size in the address bar is too small!!
And the dark tabs in the incognito mode are disturbingly ugly.
Switching to FF.
Before you blame new design in Chrome, take a look at what have done to YouTube. When I first saw it, my fingers were trembling while I chaotically looked for “Revert to old design” link. I don’t know what’s happened to Google product managers and designers, but I’m sending them a bifor being arrogant dicks.
There’s two ways, basically. First is to use Chrome 54 from PortableApps.com. Second (and this is what I’ve chosen) is to use Opera. It still retains the eye-candyness of the good old Chrome, only it’s faster.
I’m another one that is simply switching the browser I use because of this. The material design is so, so awful, I really can’t stand it.
Material Design is HORRIBLE!!! Switching to FireFOX. Google YOU SUCK more and more. Why do you push things that a lot of people don’t like? Maybe you took too many people from Microsoft!
Try this !!!
https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/classic-blue-theme-back-t/jammgopjmlachkjhifkdjccbphdcapei
Thank-you very much for the link Uzi! My biggest issue was the dreary, depressing grey tombstone tabs. Now that I have the blues again, I am much happier.
Happy for you.
That was my problem also !!
Good bye chrome!
Happy for you..
It was my problem also..
Very disappointed in Google for this. The back tabs are, frankly, horrible enough to tempt me into changing browsers. The old designs were nowhere near as eye-hurting as this, all the black contrast in the current version is nothing but distracting and headache-inducing.
The fact that they have removed the capability for us to switch out of the god awful material design is brutal. The font is clearly aimed at teens. It literally hurts my eyes trying to read anything in the url or the tabs. Back to firefox for me!
I woke up Christmas morning to this infuriating monstrosity and discovered that it is now permanent. BAH-HUMBUG Google! I’m sick of having unnecessary updates shoved down my throat without the option to disable. Please restore the ability to revert to “Non-Material” toolbar. I do not wish to see tombstone tabs and microscopic print. Maybe it’s time to switch browsers.
Material is really coool!
Well, it’s okay. It’s at least a BIG jump into the modern world. Non material was just so old school. I still see why some people hate it.
I was able to manage/ edit the bookmarks with the previous scheme, and I’m not able to do it anymore with this Material Design restriction. It was much more easy and fast to check the whole URL lists. Not anymore. I was relieved with the reverse option until I realised I had no opt-out -option left anymore. Shame.