Google begins rolling out customizable Search widget to more users

Abner Li | Sep 20 2018 - 5:51 pm PT

Late last month, the Google app resumed work on a customizable Search bar. A long time coming, the ability to personalize the Google widget appears to be rolling out to more users this week.

Accessible from the fifth “More” tab of the Google app, “Customize Widget” allows users to edit the appearance of the standard Google widget. By default, it is white and rectangular with very minimal rounded corner. It features a multi-colored Google logo and voice search icon to the right.

Tapping opens an editor that displays the widget against your current wallpaper to provide a better sense of its final appearance. The first option edits the “Bar logo,” with users able to choose between “Google” and “G.” As you select an option, the widget preview updates.

“Bar shape” allows you to select between the standard look, slightly more rounded rectangle, and lastly a pill this is common throughout the Google Material Theme.

“Bar color” is extremely customizable with users able to choose between three presets and a color slider. The first option is a white background, while the second is also white but with a gray Google logo and microphone search icon. Third is an inversion with a dark gray bar, while the last option gives you two sliders. Up top is the full color spectrum, while the second lets users pinpoint the precise shade.

Lastly, “Bar shading” is a transparency shader ranging from See-through on the far-left and Solid at the right. Once done, you can tap “Done” in the upper-right corner. The primary screen of the editor features a “Reset to default style” to start over.

So far, we’ve spotted this option enabled on several devices running the latest Google app 8.21 beta. Earlier this week, there were other reports of users seeing the editor active. However, a handful of 8.20 devices we’ve check do not have this option yet. The current beta should begin rolling out to the stable channel tomorrow.

Last September, version 7.12 began testing a customizable “Google Bar.” Despite several revisions tracked over the course of 2017, the feature never widely launched, though a small number of users have had it enabled. Late last month, the app began adding text descriptions in version 8.19 that detail the various user customizable options.