How can I set a custom start page or home page in Brave for Android? I’ve found this support page but the menu items mentioned there don’t exist. There is no such item as “homepage” in the basics section or anywhere else in the settings. That content might be outdated. Other web sources suggest the same and are just as outdated.
I just noticed that the support page says “when the home button is pressed”. I don’t even have a home button. Are we talking about the same Android browser? I want a custom page to open when I open a new tab.
Hm. I see. I have to let the browser occupy some more vertical space only to have a home page button that I still have to press myself. That’s not what I wanted.
What I want is to replace the default new tab page. I don’t see any use in that. It contains random links and not what I need. I’ve already tried to disable all of its content, but after deselecting the big background image, all of the other content came back and I cannot remove it anymore. Instead of seeing all of this junk, I want my custom page to appear. I made myself a little start page containing all the links I regularly use. Using that page as home page on every device in every browser, I don’t need to synchronise parts of my bookmarks over different browsers (Firefox, Brave etc.). But it doesn’t seem like such a productivity feature is supported by any browser. I always have to click a home button manually. In desktop browsers, at least, I can middle-click that button to see it in a new tab immediately. Mobile browsers are not capable of that.
You can disable the bottom toolbar after you have set up your homepage, that won’t affect it, but of course will hide the homepage button.
You can additionally clean up the new tab page by disabling Privacy report (Settings → Privacy report), and then you can disable the widgets (Settings → New tab page → Widget Stack).
I guess that’s as much you can configure Brave, replacing the new tab page with your own isn’t possible as of now.
I already tried to hide the bottom toolbar again. But since hitting that home page button is the only way to load my custom home page, without the bottom toolbar, there is no home button. So the setting that’s inaccessible without the bottom bar is also ineffective without the bottom bar. In that regard, the UI is already consistent and there’s no hidden setting here.
Privacy report is already disabled. The widget list is all empty, I can add 3 available items but none are selected. Looks like Brave doesn’t want to show an empty page there. A bug? A missed chance to show the home page (with the invisible setting) instead?
It looks like Brave won’t display an empty new tab page for some reason, I don’t know if that’s how it’s supposed to work. I agree with you, it’s a missed opportunity for users to customize the new tab page however they like.
At this time, if you want just a blank white NTP, go to Menu --> Settings --> New Tab page and disable Background images. For the Home page issue, I do see the annoyance that can come from this – I’ve reached out to the team to see if we have plans to address this. I do see that we have an open issue for the homepage only being visible with the bottom toolbar enabled:
That’s exactly what I described isn’t working. When I do this, I don’t get a blank page, but a page without a background image but with all of the widgets visible and not removable.
And actually I’m not interested in the home button. I want that home page to be displayed automatically when I open a new tab. Should I comment in that issue or open a new one? (Before a home button is added somewhere in the limited UI space, a new tab button would be more helpful for me.)
For now, I help myself with showing a background image and just the “leading websites” section and just hope that my home page will always be in that list. It’s an ugly hack but it gets me to where I need to be.
@ygoe,
You’re right – checking myself, I also don’t see a way to remove the widgets, which seems strange. I will reach out to the team to see if this is something in the works or if there is a specific reason the option isn’t there right now. Will reply when I know more.
Yes you’re welcome to comment on that issue if you’d like.