The New Tab page is what Chrome shows every time you open a new tab. On a computer you change it from the Customize Chrome button at the bottom right of any New Tab page. Chrome’s settings have no option for a completely blank page, but you can get close:
- Open a new tab and select Customize Chrome at the bottom right.
- Under Shortcuts, turn off Show shortcuts.
- Under Cards, hide the cards you don’t want.
The search box stays. For a page with nothing on it at all, use an extension (see below). These steps follow Google’s help page Customize your New Tab page in Chrome, which notes that you must be signed in to your Google Account and use Google as your default search engine to customize the page. If you use another search engine, see how to change your search engine in Chrome.
Make the New Tab page blank with an extension
An extension can replace the New Tab page with one of its own. Empty New Tab Page in the Chrome Web Store does only that: new tabs open as a plain blank page instead of the usual one. Select Add to Chrome on its store page to install it.
To go back to Chrome’s own New Tab page, remove the extension: select More (the three dots at the top right) > Extensions > Manage extensions, then select Remove on the extension, as Google’s extension help describes.
Shortcuts: your own sites or most visited
The row of sites under the search box can show sites you pick or sites you visit often.
- Select Customize Chrome at the bottom right of a New Tab page.
- Under Shortcuts, select My shortcuts or Most visited sites. To hide the row, turn off Show shortcuts.
To edit or remove one site, point to its icon, select More at the top right of the icon, then Edit shortcut or Remove.
Background image, theme and color
- Select Customize Chrome at the bottom right of a New Tab page.
- Under Appearance, select Change theme.
- Pick a theme from the gallery, or select Upload an image to use your own picture.
Chrome suggests a browser color to match. You can pick a different color under Appearance, and choose Light, Dark or Device to set the mode. To change the background every day, open a collection and turn on Refresh daily. To undo all of it, select Reset to Default Chrome at the bottom of the panel.
Cards below the search box
Cards show things like sites you were recently looking at and tabs open on your other devices. You must be signed in to your Google Account for them to appear. To choose which ones show, select Customize Chrome, then Cards > Customize Cards, and turn each card on or off. To hide a single card for now, select More on the card itself.
See which extension controls your New Tab page
If an extension has taken over your New Tab page, Chrome names it in a footer at the bottom of the page. To show the footer, select Customize Chrome and, under Footer, turn on Show footer on New Tab page.
If the page is full of ads, uses a search engine you didn’t pick, or sends you to another site, follow our guide to fixing a New Tab page that redirects.
Open the New Tab page when Chrome starts
To have Chrome open on this page instead of your last tabs or a website, go to chrome://settings/onStartup and choose Open the new tab page. Our guide to the Chrome homepage and startup page explains the other options.