Google Chrome gains AI features including a writing helper, theme creator, and tab organizer

Google’s Chrome web browser is getting an infusion of AI technology in the latest release. The company announced today it’s soon adding a trio of new AI-powered features to Chrome for Mac and Windows, including a way to smartly organize your tabs, customize your theme, and get help when writing things on the web — like forum posts, online reviews, and more.

The latter is similar to a feature already available to Google’s experimental AI search experience, SGE (Search Generative Experience), which allows users to get help drafting things like emails in different tones, like more formal or more casual, or in different lengths.

With the built-in writing helper in Chrome, Google suggests users could write business reviews, “craft a friendly RSVP to a party,” or make a more formal inquiry about a vacation rental, among other things, including writing posts in public spaces, like online forum sites.

The still-experimental feature will be accessible in next month’s Chrome release by right-clicking on a text box or field on the web and then choosing “help me write.” To get started, you’ll first write a few words and then Google’s AI will jump in to help.

In addition to the writing assistant, AI can also be used to help organize tab groups and personalize your browser.

Chrome’s Tab Groups feature allows users who keep many tabs open to manage them by organizing them into groups. However, curating them can be a manual process, the company explains. With the new Tab Organizer, Chrome will automatically suggest and create groups based on the tabs you already have open. This feature will be available by right-clicking on a tab and selecting “Organize Similar Tabs.” Chrome will also suggest names and emojis for the tab groups it creates to make them easier to find. This feature is intended to assist when users are online shopping, researching, trip planning, or doing other tasks that tend to leave a lot of open tabs.

A final addition mirrors the new generative AI wallpaper experience that recently arrived on Android 14 and Pixel devices. Now, Google will use the same text-to-image diffusion model to allow users to generate custom themes for their Chrome browser. The feature allows you to generate these themes by subject, mood, visual style, and color by selecting the new “Create with AI” option after opening the “Customize Chrome” side panel and clicking “Change theme.” Before, Chrome offered a variety of colorful but simple themes to choose from alongside those from artists, but this feature will allow users to expand beyond the built-in choices to create a theme that better matches their own current vibe.

Though a busy theme could be distracting, the feature at least allows users who don’t have an Android phone to test drive Google’s generative AI for personalization, even if they end up returning to a more basic theme for day-to-day use.

While the drafting feature won’t arrive until next month’s Chrome release, Google says that the other features, like the tab organizer and AI theme creator, will roll out over the next few days in the U.S. on both Mac and Windows with the current Chrome release (M121). To access these features, you’ll sign into Chrome, select “Settings” from the three-dot menu, and then navigate to the “Experimental AI” page. Because the features are experimental, they won’t ship to enterprise and educational customers at this time, the company notes.

The features join other AI-powered and machine learning (ML) tools already available in Chrome, like its ability to caption audio and video, protect users from malicious sites via Android’s Safe Browsing feature in Chrome, silence permission prompts, and summarize web pages via the “SGE while browsing” feature.

Google says that Chrome will be updated with more AI and ML features in the coming year, including through integrations with its new AI model, Gemini, which will be used to help make web browsing easier.