Count what your new tab shows you: tiles you never picked, cards, a news feed, six widgets added in one keen evening. A minimalist new tab has almost nothing on it, and what is left has earned its place. Getting there is mostly taking things away.
The pictures use Backs, the Chrome new tab we make, because its widgets, called Backons, are what this site can draw. Most ideas work in any new tab tool.
Start a minimalist new tab by taking things away
Remove everything, then add back what you looked at yesterday
We think clearing a crowded page beats trimming it, because item by item everything has an excuse. Clear it, then ask one question: what did you look at yesterday? Add back that and nothing else. In Backs, click Move (the square with four arrows), then drag each Backon off any edge of the screen. The menu has them all.
Try a page with one thing on it
The strictest version keeps one thing: a clock, or today's three tasks. We would start with the clock: it answers a question at a glance and asks nothing back. Backs has a compact digital clock, a large one, upright versions of both and an analogue face. For tasks, keep the list to three and swap one out when a fourth turns up.
Move and Menu are small squares that fit in a corner. They can go too: the Backs icon in Chrome's toolbar opens a panel with the same two buttons.
Choose a photo with a calm half
With so little on it, the page is mostly photo. Choose one with a plain half, such as sky, water or fog, and put everything you keep inside it. In Backs a Backon sits wherever you drop it on the grid.
Decide what survives
One accent colour and no more
Colour counts as clutter: three things in three colours look busier than five in one. Use one colour for text and lines, and one accent for the thing that should catch the eye. Backs takes a light colour, a dark colour and one accent from the background photo.
Move the weekly things to a second Space
Some things matter once a week: a reading list, the links for a monthly report. They do not belong on the page you open all day. In Backs a Space is a separate saved page, and the free plan includes two: keep the everyday one bare and give the weekly things the second. The price is one more Backon, the Space Backon, whose arrows switch between them.
Tidy once a month
Pages fill up again, one reasonable addition at a time. Once a month, ask of each thing whether you glanced at it since the last tidy. If not, remove it, after reading any note or list that is about to go.
A blank page is an honest option
If nothing passed the yesterday question, keep nothing. A blank new tab is a fair answer, and Chrome's address bar still searches. In Backs, remove every Backon and the photo is all that is left.
Chrome's own page can be stripped back with no extension. These names come from Google's help page in British English; Customise Chrome is Customize Chrome in the US.
- Open a new tab and click Customise Chrome at the bottom right.
- Under Shortcuts, turn Show shortcuts off.
- Click Cards, then Customise cards, and choose the cards to hide.
The search box stays: the help page lists no switch for it. If a footer names the extension in control of the page, right-click it and choose Hide footer on New tab page.
Questions people ask
- What is the most minimal new tab?
- A blank one. Next comes a page with one thing, such as a clock. We think one useful thing beats none, but that is taste.
- Can Chrome's new tab be blank?
- Not fully from Chrome's own settings: shortcuts and cards can be hidden, but the search box stays. A page with nothing on it takes an extension: search the Chrome Web Store for a blank new tab.
- Does a minimalist page need an extension?
- No. Chrome's own page can be stripped back in three steps. An extension is for choosing the few things that remain and where they sit.
- Is a bare page in Backs free?
- Yes. Everything here is on the free plan and needs no account. Premium is optional: €3.99 a month or €39.99 a year, with a 14-day trial.
Photo via Unsplash