Chrome on Android experiments with new floating snackbars to push notifications over web content

Google is now testing new “floating snackbars” on Chrome on Android. Once activated, the feature “enables the snackbar to float on top of the web content.”

We’ve now spotted a commit message on Chromium Gerrit, which indicates that Google has added a flag to use and implement the feature. And, there’s also a flag on Chrome Canary, the browser’s experimental channel, to enable it.

Snackbars in browsers are designed to display notifications at the bottom of the screen on mobile devices for a few seconds then disappear automatically. They are not intrusive, do not obstruct content, and are used by apps to inform users about something the app has performed or needs to perform.

Some examples are confirming that a form submission is successful, options to undo actions (delete an email, for example), and letting users know about processes like file uploads and downloads. And if you encounter network errors during browsing, they can also notify you.

So, in Chrome on Android, these floating snackbars can tell you about various actions within the browser, like adding a bookmark, warning about potential security risks, and more. They’re pretty much associated with Google’s Material Design guidelines commonly used in Android apps and have even been adopted by iOS and web development.

The Mountain View tech giant has been experimenting with plenty of new features on Chrome’s Android version.

Just recently, we reported that Chrome on Android could get new iOS-like animation for back-and-forward gestures. There’s also a new mechanism for reordering tab groups by long-pressing the tab indicators, a bookmark bar like on desktops, and more.