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Get this app to check out Android 12's wallpaper-based themes on any phone right now
The complete rewrite of the dark mode enforcer app also packs significant technical improvements
Android introduced a proper system-wide dark mode back in 2019, but many app developers still haven't come around implementing proper dark themes for their apps — even Google didn't update Google Maps until earlier this year. That's where a neat app from a third-party developer comes in, Kieron Quinn's DarQ. It uses hidden system hooks in Android 10 and higher to force dark mode on unsupported apps, and it has just received its biggest update yet to version 2.0 — complete with wallpaper-based app colors thanks to Android 12's Monet theming system. It even works on lower Android versions.
Chrome 86 removes the last remaining website forced dark mode flag
The feature won't see the light of day after all
Google has been working on a forced dark mode for Chrome on Android, giving each and every website a black-and-gray makeover, regardless of whether it has a native dark theme or not. Over the last year, the company has poured tons of resources into making this a great experience, but it looks like the developers aren't happy with how the feature is coming together. All options to enable forced dark theme have been removed from the latest Canary build of Chrome for Android, version 86.
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- This feature is partly broken as of Q Beta 4. Trying to enable the setting in developer options merely results in a crash, booting you back out as the setting remains toggled off. Presumably, this will also affect the "alternative" slightly-tweaked dark mode we spotted (which was probably a bug).
Google has officially announced dark mode for Android Q at I/O and has updated the Material Guidelines telling developers how to properly implement the theme in their apps. But of course, there's always going to be some apps that simply won't receive a gray look, be it because it's abandoned or just not a priority to the developer. To test how the OS could circumvent these, Q Beta 3 introduces a brute method that forces all apps into dark mode.