Chrome 84: Google is bringing back ‘Force Color Profile’ flag

If you’ve updated to Chrome 84 and noticed colors washed out on your monitor for browser UI and website content? This is because the Chrome flag –“Force color profile”– you enabled to use a specific color profile has been removed in version 84. The Good news is Google has extended this flag to Chrome 89 after user reports and will appear in a couple of weeks if there is any update. Meanwhile, you can follow the workarounds given in this article to fix color issues in Chrome.browser.

Google has recently released Chrome 84 and is available for download.

After updating to the latest version, some users noticed a few issues.

• The new tab page wallpaper was set to blank
• Chrome browser window’s Minimize, Maximize and Close buttons are missing

Another issue is if you’ve forced Chrome to use sRGB color profile for your monitor or laptop, the colors look ugly and bad in the Chrome browser after the update.

The Force color profile flag which allowed users to enable certain color profiles from –sRGB, Display P3 D65, Color spin with gamma 2.4, sRGB linear (HDR where available), HDR10 (HDR where available) — has vanished from Chrome 84.

Here is what the flag does when enabled:

“Forces Chrome to use a specific color profile instead f color of Windows’s current monitor, as specified by Operating System”.

Chromium employee acknowledged the issue and made a commit to delay the expiration of Force Color profile flag to Chrome 89. He says “Let’s continue the 84 rollout. I’ll land this and merge to 84, in case there is a respin in 2 weeks.”

Until then, affected users can try either of the below workarounds.

Workarounds

I.

1. Launch Chrome

2. Click on menu, select Settings

3. Click Advanced

4. Disable “Use hardware acceleration when available”

II.

1. Right-click on Chrome shortcut on the desktop and select Properties

2. In the Target field, after chrome.exe” give space and add “--force-color-profile=srgb” (without quotes).

Chrome’s Target field should be like this: "C:Program Files (x86)GoogleChromeApplicationchrome.exe" --force-color-profile=srgb

3. Click Apply.

Unless otherwise noted, the changes and workarounds also apply for Chromium-based Microsoft Edge 84.

UPDATE: The flag is now available in Chrome 86 Canary.

UPDATE July 28, 2020: The force Color Profile flag has been restored in Chrome 84.0.4147.105.

Are you affected? And any of the workarounds mentioned above fixed the issue for you? Let us know in the comments below.

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