Chrome for Android now lets you preview a page before fully opening

The last major update to mobile Chrome introduced a grid layout for tabs and the ability to group them. A more minor Chrome addition on Android today lets you preview a page before fully opening it.

The context menu that appears when long pressing links now has a “Preview page” option. Appearing between “Open in incognito tab” and “Copy link address,” tapping slides up a sheet for the page in question that covers the majority of your screen, but cannot be expanded further.

A top bar includes the site’s favicon, page name, and domain, as well as a button to open in a proper window (as part of groups). You can close it from the top-right corner “x” or by swiping down on the pull tab.

This addition is surprisingly useful for certain users, especially in light of how tabs open today. It gives you a chance to decide whether something is worth committing to a group, and makes you more judicious about open page/queue management.

The new “Preview page” capability is rolling out to Chrome 89 for Android via server-side update this evening. Google has been working on this feature for over two years, and it’s now ready for prime time in the stable channel.

:story: 9to5Google