Chrome 148 forces bookmarks bar on extension New Tab pages even when disabled

[Alexander Ostapenko]

Hi,

After updating to Chrome 148, I started seeing a new behavior affecting extensions that override the New Tab page.

The bookmarks bar is now shown on the extension New Tab page even when:

• “Show bookmarks bar” is disabled in Chrome settings
• the bookmarks bar stays hidden correctly on normal websites

This started happening recently and appears to affect New Tab extensions

Behavior observed:

• regular websites → bookmarks bar hidden
• extension-based New Tab page → bookmarks bar forced visible
• enabling/disabling the global setting no longer behaves consistently

This creates a UX conflict because:

• users explicitly disabled the bookmarks bar
• Chrome still forces it on extension New Tab pages

The current implementation conflicts with the existing “Show bookmarks bar” logic and creates confusion for both users and extension developers.

Chrome version:
148.0.7778.97

Thanks

[Juraj M.]

It's a consistency fix! 🙃  Apparently, this option was always ignored on New tab page, and they wanted to make this behavior consistent with custom New tab pages :D.

In any case, they seem to be reverting this feature:
https://issues.chromium.org/issues/511465813#comment7

I can see it reverted in 150, not 149 - which is scheduled for release in a week.

So it will be likely fixed in 5 weeks (plus update delay days).

[Alexander Ostapenko]

Thanks a lot for the clarification and the link.

That makes much more sense now 🙂
Good to know it’s already being reverted in Chrome 150.

Really appreciate the help!

среда, 13 мая 2026 г. в 20:02:01 UTC+2, Juraj M.:

[woxxom]

The latest 148.0.7778.179 update has restored the previous behavior.