The Persistent Bookmarks Bar
Google Chrome features a Bookmarks Bar that you can toggle on or off (using Ctrl + Shift + B). When you turn it off, the bar disappears, giving you more vertical screen real estate for viewing web pages. However, you might notice a strange behavior: even when the Bookmarks Bar is explicitly disabled, it still forcefully appears whenever you open a New Tab page.
Google designed this behavior assuming that when you open a blank tab, you likely want quick access to your saved sites. But for users who prefer a completely minimalist, distraction-free New Tab page (perhaps featuring a clean wallpaper or a simple search box), this forced Bookmarks Bar is an annoying visual clutter that breaks their customized aesthetic. You can force Chrome to hide it everywhere.
How to Hide Bookmarks on the New Tab Page
While there isn’t a direct toggle switch for this specific behavior in the main settings menu, you can bypass it.
- Open Google Chrome.
- First, ensure the global Bookmarks Bar is actually turned off. Click the Three Vertical Dots > Bookmarks and lists > and ensure Show bookmarks bar is unchecked.
- If the bar still appears on a New Tab, you must change your default search engine. Chrome only forces the Bookmarks Bar to appear on the New Tab page if your search engine is set to Google (and utilizing the default Google NTP design).
- Click the Three Vertical Dots > Settings.
- In the left-hand sidebar, click on Search engine.
- Change the “Search engine used in the address bar” to something else, like DuckDuckGo or Bing.
When you open a New Tab page using a different default search provider, Chrome will render a truly blank page (or the provider’s custom page) and will finally respect your command to keep the Bookmarks Bar completely hidden.