Chrome for Android's 'Sneak Peek' loads a link without leaving current tab

When you tap and hold on a link in Chrome for Android, you can either open it in a new tab or an incognito tab. Chrome Canary and Chrome Dev now have a third way to open those links: ‘Sneak Peek.’

Spotted by Android Police, Sneak Peek loads a link as an overlay at the bottom of the page. You can swipe up on it to expand it further, though it won’t cover the entire page. Once expanded, the overlay behaves like any other tab — you can swipe through the opened link, copy and paste, and more.

You can swipe down on the overlay to bring it back to the bottom, or swipe down even further to close it. There is also an X button on the top right that closes the overlay, regardless of whether the overlay is expanded or minimized.

Unfortunately, you can’t expand the overlay into its own tab. Google might include the functionality in a future update, since Sneak Peek is currently in testing.

Either way, Sneak Peek is a great feature for those that want to check out links and not want to open a new tab to do so. If you want to test it out in Chrome Canary or Chrome Dev, access the flag chrome://flags/#enable-ephemeral-tab and set it to Enabled.