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Chrome for Mac Gets New Downloads Experience

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Google today announced a new Chrome downloads experience for its desktop browser, with the update aimed at making it easier to interact with recently downloaded files.

chrome-search-interface.jpg

Chrome's updated download tray is located to the right of the address bar, and it replaces the interface at the bottom of the display. The new look is closer to the Safari download window, which is also at the top of the browser.

When a download is in progress, an animated ring will provide a quick way to monitor the download at a glance, and when the download has finished, the tray will open up briefly before dismissing itself for uninterrupted browsing. The download tray houses Chrome downloads from the past 24 hours, and it includes in-line options for opening the folder that a download went to. Downloads can be canceled, retried, paused, and resumed from the download tray.

Potentially malicious downloads will continue to trigger an alert, with the new interface providing additional context if malware or a virus is detected in a download. Google says that a more advanced deep scan function will be coming in the near future.

Google today also highlighted several new features that have been added to Chrome for iOS. When tapping on the address bar of an eligible site, Chrome will bring up relevant search suggestions. As an example, if you're reading an article about Japan, Chrome will show related searches for restaurants and tourist attractions in a new "Related to this page" interface.

chrome-mobile.jpg

Chrome is also now offering more search suggestions. When starting a search, you'll see 10 suggestions for things you might want to search for, up from six. The most relevant suggestions in the list will show up first.

Later this year, Google plans to add a trending feature to iOS. Already available on Android devices, the trending feature shows you what's popular with Google searches directly from the Chrome address bar.

More information on the new features can be found on the Chrome blog.

Article Link: Chrome for Mac Gets New Downloads Experience
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2023/08/02/chrome-mac-downloads-revamp/
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Lipstick on a pig. Chrome has fallen to the fate of IE and Firefox before it. It is bloatware and spyware now. All three started out with the intent to be lean and fast and grew into these behemoths. Google tries to entice users with little things like this but newer, cleaner competitors like Edge and Brave outpace it. Safari hasn’t fallen the same way and I’m not sure why. It’s a bit of an interesting anomaly in this regard. On topic though, face lifts won’t bring me back.
 
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I have been using Chrome on Silicon Macs. It shows I have Version 115.0.5790.114 (Official Build) (arm64) and says I am already up-to-date. What is the new version number? How do I force an update?
 
MacRumors said:
Later this year, Google plans to add a trending feature to iOS. Already available on Android devices, the trending feature shows you what's popular with Google searches directly from the Chrome address bar.
Click to expand...
Now that is really stupid, “trending” searches, so if you’re looking for something you really gotta see what everyone else is searching on Google… good thing I won’t install this on my iphone
 
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coolbreeze2 said:
I have been using Chrome on Silicon Macs. It shows I have Version 115.0.5790.114 (Official Build) (arm64) and says I am already up-to-date. What is the new version number? How do I force an update?
Click to expand...
Stable Channel Update for Desktop

This is the download behavior on Microsoft Edge Chromium and Google Chrome followed suit... Mozilla Firefox has this download panel for many years/versions now...
 
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It’s not Arc though, is it?

Getting closer to Safari w/r/t look and feel, and that’s not a compliment in comparison.
 
rm5 said:
This's been in Experiments since like the beginning of the year, used to be called "Enable Download Bubble" and "Enable Download Bubble V2"
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And in fact, when I installed the Google Chrome Beta to try this out after reading this article, I found this "new feature" nowhere to be found. Chrome Beta was still using the old bottom tray to indicate downloads, and I couldn't find any way in Settings to get the behavior this article is touting. And the link to the Chrome blog didn't help out any.

Did a Google search to find out what I was missing and found the info you touch on here. On a whim, I launched non-beta Chrome to try it out. After enabling it and playing around with it a bit there, I returned to Chrome Beta and restarted it (without changing any config in the beta app), and there it was.

So not a new feature in Chrome Beta at all.

EDIT: Am I going crazy, or what? I swear the article specified that Chrome Beta was needed for this, and now it doesn't mention betas at all. But I see no "updated" indicator on the article...
 
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I’m going to to against the grain here and say i like chrome for ios. But i cant use it. Without ad blockers or content filters, there is just so many ads that make the browser impossible to use. So the new features useless for ios for me.

For desktop, i like the bottom bar. Was unique and one click solution. They enhanced it by making you click 2-3 times and can’t glance at multiple downloads. “Improved” to me always means cost cutting, bad quality, or poor design choices and I’m not just talking software here.
 
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dljeffery said:
And in fact, when I installed the Google Chrome Beta to try this out after reading this article, I found this "new feature" nowhere to be found. Chrome Beta was still using the old bottom tray to indicate downloads, and I couldn't find any way in Settings to get the behavior this article is touting. And the link to the Chrome blog didn't help out any.
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ikr! I just updated Chrome and it's nowhere to be found, and the thing's still in Experiments! Maybe it's a feature thats only rolling out to some people right now...

Whatever, if you wanna have the "new" download tray in the top right, just enable these in Experiments

Screenshot 2023-08-02 at 2.46.00 PM.png
 
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aloshka said:
For desktop, i like the bottom bar. Was unique and one click solution. They enhanced it by making you click 2-3 times and can’t glance at multiple downloads. “Improved” to me always means cost cutting, bad quality, or poor design choices and I’m not just talking software here.
Click to expand...
I find the bottom bar to be incredibly intrusive on a small display. On a large monitor, it's fine, but you lose like a lot of space if just using Chrome on a laptop. And I even have it in full screen, and it still feels intrusive
 
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