New Google Chrome feature: Videos will automatically continue to play in picture-in-picture mode when switching tabs

Google Chrome is launching a new feature that will automatically play YouTube and other videos in picture-in-picture (PiP) mode when you switch tabs or windows. Chrome’s new picture-in-picture feature is coming to desktops, including Windows 11, Windows 10, macOS and ChromeOS.

If you're watching a video on Chrome and decide to jump to another tab, the browser will automatically put the video into a convenient Picture-in-Picture (PiP) mode. This new feature is similar to the "Automatically open picture-in-picture for video websites" option in Microsoft Edge Canary.

In Chrome, you can turn this feature on or off through the Site Settings section. In a Chromium bug report, Google noted that it is working on a new UI feature that will let you choose whether you want the automatic picture-in-picture feature to start when switching tabs or windows.

"Auto Picture-in-Picture" will work in any document in Picture-in-Picture mode if the associated "Flicker" feature is turned on.

"This CL adds a draft user interface for allowing/blocking content settings for AutoPiP windows. It does not attempt to match any UI mock; it just adds some scaffolding for us to use when building functionality and the UI itself."

Chrome’s automatic PiP mode may be a nice feature for many users.

For example, when you're watching a long tutorial on YouTube, you need to switch tabs to jot down some notes or find related content. With this feature, the video will smoothly shift to a corner, allowing you to multitask without missing any part of the video. This is all designed to make your browsing experience more seamless and convenient.

Google has been working hard to improve the Chrome browser on Windows and other platforms.

As we recently reported, Chrome will be rolling out a new incognito experience, and in incognito mode the browser will attempt to hide browsing of media content. This means that Chrome will not display sensitive or media content (metadata) in the operating system's media controls. In other words, Google will not leak media payment information in the Chrome browser.

Another new feature is support for "Tracking Protection" in the browser. According to the Google Chromium open source project ChromiumGerrit, the search engine also plans to consolidate all privacy and tracking-related features into a page called "Tracking Protection."

Google's update isn't limited to new features, the company is also giving the browser a fresh design using the Material theme.