If you’ve encountered a gray screen after updating Google Chrome to version 139, you’re certainly not alone. Many users have reported similar issues, which stem from a rendering bug in the latest update. Fortunately, there is a straightforward workaround to help you resolve this problem. Read on to discover how you can fix the gray screen issue in Chrome.
Understanding the Gray Screen in Google Chrome
The appearance of a gray screen following the Chrome 139 update can be attributed to a bug in the browser’s rendering process. This issue disrupts the GPU-backend graphics stack, preventing Chrome from properly displaying pages, which can sometimes result in a gray, white, or black screen. Although Chrome is capable of rendering pages using the CPU, it relies on hardware acceleration by default to enhance overall performance through the GPU.
To facilitate hardware acceleration, Chrome utilizes a GPU compositor alongside ANGLE (Almost Native Graphics Layer Engine).ANGLE plays a crucial role by translating OpenGL ES calls into platform-specific APIs. When OpenGL is selected as the ANGLE backend, it may lead to output errors under the new version, resulting in the frustrating gray screen users are experiencing.
Currently, there is no official solution from Google for this bug; however, a temporary fix is available that can restore functionality.
How to Resolve the Gray Screen Issue in Chrome
The simplest way to mitigate this issue is by changing the ANGLE backend from OpenGL to another option within Chrome. However, since the gray screen prevents access to the Chrome flags menu, you must first disable hardware acceleration outside of the browser. Follow these steps:
- Close Chrome completely.
- Right-click on the Chrome icon and select Properties.
- In the Target field, add the following text after a space:
--disable-gpu. It should appear as follows:
"C:\Program Files\Google\Chrome\Application\chrome.exe" --disable-gpu
Click OK to save the changes, then launch Chrome again. You should find that it operates normally now.
While this workaround addresses the gray screen issue, please be aware that hardware acceleration will remain disabled, which may lead to performance drawbacks. Ideally, it’s best to select the default ANGLE backend and enable hardware acceleration for optimized browsing experience.
To proceed, type chrome://flags in Chrome’s address bar to access experimental features and then search for “angle.” Set the value for the Choose ANGLE graphics backend flag to Default or D3D11. A restart of Chrome will be required for the changes to take effect.
Once you’ve applied these changes, you can safely remove the --disable-gpu command from the Chrome properties to take full advantage of hardware acceleration again.
If you need to use OpenGL as the ANGLE backend for any reason, you’ll have to wait until Google releases an official fix for this issue. Additionally, similar problems may occur in other Chromium-based browsers, so it’s advisable to check those as well. If these instructions do not solve your problem, consider exploring other troubleshooting tips for Chrome’s black screen issue.
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