Incognito mode on Chrome for Android just got a lot more useful

Imagine the following scenario: You're browsing something in Incognito mode on your phone's Google Chrome browser. For whatever reason, you need to hand the phone to someone else, and at the last moment you remember that you don't want that person to see the contents of your Incognito tab. Awkward excuses and accusatory glances ensue while you fumble to kill the Incognito tab before you finally hand over the device.

Good news: This is getting fixed. In an update on its official Chrome blog, Google said Incognito sessions can now automatically be locked when you leave Chrome. To enable the feature go to Chrome Settings → Privacy and Security → Turn on “Lock incognito tabs when you close Chrome.”

Now, if an Incognito tab happens to be open on your Chrome, the next time you open the browser you'll have to unlock it to see the contents, be it via face recognition, fingerprint scanner, or a passcode.

The feature is already live on iOS, but it's now also rolling out to Android users (side note: when did Google start pushing features on iOS first, and Android second?). It's off by default, so you will have to manually enable it to get it to work.

As for the usefulness of this feature: Look, we don't know (or want to know) what it is you're doing in Incognito mode, but its very existence is about users keeping their private sessions to themselves. This new option makes Incognito a little more private, and given that there are a lot of Chrome users on Android out there, we reckon it'll be useful to a lot of people.