How do I get dark mode in Chrome on a Mac?

Published October 20, 2026

You switched your Mac to dark, the Dock went dark, Finder went dark, and Chrome stayed stubbornly light. Or the opposite: Chrome is dark, but the page you're reading isn't. Both have simple explanations.

Step 1: turn on Dark Mode on the Mac

1. Open the System Settings app.^[1]
2. Click Appearance in the sidebar. You may need to scroll down.^[1]
3. Select Dark, or Auto to switch from light to dark following your Night Shift schedule.^[1]

Apple notes that Auto won't change the appearance until your Mac has been idle for at least a minute.^[1] So if you're typing at sunset and nothing happens, that's normal. For a quick switch, Control Center has a Dark Mode button under Display.^[1]

Step 2: tell Chrome to follow it

1. Open a New Tab page in Chrome.
2. At the bottom right, select Customize Chrome.^[2]
3. Under Appearance, choose Device to follow your Mac, or Dark to keep Chrome dark whatever the Mac does.^[2]

If Chrome is set to Light, it stays light even when your Mac is dark. That one setting explains most “Chrome won't go dark on Mac” moments.^[2]

What actually turns dark

Google is precise about this: in dark mode, Chrome's homepage, toolbar, settings and some other pages are dark.^[2] Websites are a separate matter. A site can read your system preference through a CSS feature called prefers-color-scheme and offer its own dark version, if its makers built one.^[3]

That's why a dark Mac with a dark Chrome can still show you a bright white page. Our article on why websites stay white in Chrome dark mode goes deeper.

Small things worth knowing

• Incognito windows may look dark even in light mode.^[2] That's not your setting changing.
• Auto mode is tied to Night Shift on the Mac, so set a Night Shift schedule first if you want the switch at a specific hour.^[1]
• Apple's description of Dark Mode is that it makes your content stand out while windows and controls recede.^[1] Content that has no dark version simply doesn't get that treatment.

The tab that stays white: Google Docs

Google Docs is the most common white page left on a dark Mac. Docs has no dark mode on computers, so neither the Mac setting nor Chrome's reaches the document.

Keeptab Dark is our Chrome extension that darkens the page itself in Google Docs, Sheets, Slides and Excel for the web.^[4] Images keep their real colors, with no white flash when a document loads.^[4] The Soft gray theme is free, and Pro can switch on at night and off by day, following your computer, so it pairs with the Mac's Auto mode.^[4]

FAQ

Sources

1. Apple Support. Use a light or dark appearance on your Mac. https://support.apple.com/guide/mac-help/mchl52e1c2d2/mac
2. Google Chrome Help. Browse in Dark mode or Dark theme. https://support.google.com/chrome/answer/9275525?hl=en&co=GENIE.Platform%3DDesktop
3. web.dev (Google). prefers-color-scheme: Hello darkness, my old friend. https://web.dev/articles/prefers-color-scheme
4. Keeptab Dark. Dark mode for Google Docs, Sheets, Slides and Excel. https://keep-tab.com/dark/

More articles

• Night light vs dark mode: which one should you use?
• How do I turn on dark mode on a Chromebook?
• How do I turn on dark mode in Gmail?
• Why doesn't Google Docs have dark mode on a computer?
• Chrome dark mode not working on websites? Why pages stay white