Forcing Dark Mode

The CSS media feature "prefers-color-scheme" has been introduced, just like other features such as "prefers-reduced-motion" in order to allow browsers to proactively required a tailored experience from the websites being browsed. This is particular useful for accessibility but also makes the conversation between a website and its users go both ways rather than the browser just being offered up whatever is available.

Unfortunately and surprisingly, Google support for "prefers-color-scheme" is remarkably lacking, the only way to perform any action pertaining to these media settings being possible exclusively from the developer panel and changing the settings there only has a temporary effect. Similarly, many addons out there along the lines of "Dark Reader", "Dark Mode" or "Enforce Dark Mode", also surprisingly do not allow interacting with "prefers-color-scheme" in any way but instead generate a "dark version" of the website themselves based on the internal assumptions of the addon. The latter is farily bad compared to "prefers-color-scheme", especially if the website has support for "prefers-color-scheme" because the assumptions made by the addon frequently do not match what the website would offer as a "dark mode". In any case, meedia settings such as "prefers-color-scheme" or "prefers-reduced-motion" are the canonical way to request a personalized website theme.

The only way to set "dark mode" in Chrome that would send "prefers-color-scheme" to all websites, globally is to create a shortcut and launch Google Chrome with the additional –force-dark-mode parameter. For example, create a shortcut and append the –force-dark-mode parameter at the end:

C:\Users\...\AppData\Local\Chromium\Application\chrome.exe --force-dark-mode

Note that this setting does not correspond to going into the chrome flags (chrome://flags) and setting "Dark Mode" to "Enabled", which is more like Google's own take at automatically generating "dark themes" for websites and it completely disregards the "prefers-color-scheme" canonical way of doing this.

You can even use our website to check because Wizardry and Steamworks has both a "light" and a "dark" theme.

Notable Addons

  • uBlock origin - still works better compared to adblock,
  • I don't care about cookies,
    • I still don't care about cookies,
    • Bye-bye cookie banners - help prevent privacy notices of cluttering the screen,
  • Cookie AutoDelete - auto-deletes cookies from last visited domains,
  • Form History Control - store forms in case of website difficulties,
  • Snowflake - the tor Snowflake transport (used in conjunction with tor),
  • WebStickies - create stickies that are local to a given webpage and pop up again when the page is browsed to
  • there is no addon that can replace dark mode, but there is a way to launch Chrome in dark mode with the feature being already available without addons,

Install Unsupported or Older Addons

Given that Google has been following a planned obsolescence policy, it might be necessary to obtain older browser extensions and install them into an older Google chrome. To do that, the "Developer mode" must be enabled that will allow extensions to be downloaded from third-party sources. To that end, browse to chrome://extensions and toggle the "Developer mode" switch, just as illustrated.

Older versions of an addon can be found by:

  • using a website such as ungoogledextensions.com,
  • the original website or source repository of the addon creator (note that Google very meticulously curates their older versions of addons such that the former website ungoogledextensions.com might be unable to pull an older version)

fuss/chrome.txt · Last modified: 2025/02/21 14:05 by office

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