Design a theme for Google Chrome

Google Chrome has grown rapidly to become one of the most popular web browsers. One reason for this is that it is highly customisable and there are loads of free add-ons that let you change the way it works, add features, extra security and so on. There are also hundreds of ready-made themes that can be installed to change the way the browser looks.

In this workshop we will show how you can design your own theme using a free theme creator.

To make a theme you’ll need the Chrome browser, obviously, but also a graphics program capable of saving files in the PNG image file format (most will) and some simple graphics know-how – but we will explain all this as we go.

Step 1
If you don’t already have Chrome installed but would like to try the web browser, it can be downloaded from Google's Chrome page – just click the Download Google Chrome button and follow the instructions.

For the graphics side of things, pretty much any image-manipulation program will do – even the Paint program that’s included with Windows (from the Start menu, point to All Programs followed by Accessories – then click Paint). When you are ready, launch Chrome and visit the Chrome Theme website.

Step 2
Click the Theme Creator tab at the top right and at the next screen type in a name for the theme you are about to create, along with a description. Now click the Images tab.

The various components of a typical Google Chrome window (frame, toolbar and so on) are listed down the left and on the right is a preview window that displays our changes as we make them. It also helps us identify which component is which. Hover the mouse pointer over the ‘frame’ item and it will be highlighted in red.