Change Chrome New Tab URL – xFanatical

This article is written for Google Workspace for Education (GWFE) admins and educators. How to Remove Inappropriate Emojis in Gmail, Chat, and Docs.

New Tab Page vs Home Page vs Startup Page

First of all, can you tell the difference among these 3 concepts in Chrome? I want to make sure you are not confused for the rest of article.

Startup Page. Your startup page is the one that shows when you first launch Chrome on your computer.

chrome startup page settings

Home Page. Your homepage is the one you go to when you click Home button . Interestingly Google by default disabled this button out-of-the-box.

Chrome Home Page Settings

New Tab Page. A new tab page is the one you click the + button in the tabs. By default it comes with a Google search bar plus a grid of most visited shortcuts. This page is customizable via chrome extensions for a personalized taste.

Chrome New Tab Page

Problem?

While Google has supported the New tab page management in Google Admin Console, students can actually bypass and visit the original new tab page by manually typing chrome://new-tab-page in the address bar.

New tab page configuration in Google Admin Console

This article demonstrates Safe Doc can not only enforce the new tab page, but also prevents students from visiting the original new tab page. If you have yet to install Safe Doc, apply 30-days trial.

Change Chrome New Tab URL

Once you deployed Safe Doc and read Safe Doc Configuration. It’s fairly easy to set the new tab page URL. Add or set the following policy for extension to Safe Doc. The feature is managed by the policy NewTabPageUrl.

"NewTabPageUrl": {
  "Value": "https://classroom.google.com"
}

The URL value can be any sites beginning with http or https protocols. If this value is not set or left empty, this feature is disabled and the default new tab page is used.

This is an example after the change when the policy is set to Google Classroom. New tabs created, including new windows, in Chrome automatically redirects to Google Classroom.

Set Chrome New Tab page URL to Google Classroom

Can students change New Tab Page URL?

No, students do not have the permissions to change it.

You may also like other features of Safe Doc.