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Google Chrome – Multiple Profiles


October 26th, 2011

12/15/11 UPDATE: Google enabled user profiles in its’ most recent release. We’ve posted an article on how to use this new feature here. We still recommend reading this post, however, because this method keeps user data better separated.

Google Chrome Tip (difficulty – intermediate):

How to Create Multiple Profiles (i.e., multiple instances of the Google Chrome application). I’ve long used Chrome for personal use, Firefox for business use and Internet Explorer for education use. This made it easy for me to test multiple browsers and have unique settings for each one as well. For example, I have a different set of bookmark bar links on each of them. These bookmarks are relevant to the task (e.g., personal use, business and education). As many are beginning to find, Chrome is simply the fastest and most efficient browser on the market today. I found myself using Chrome for everything as the other browsers, Opera and Safari included, couldn’t keep up with the pace I work at. But there was a dilemnia, my business shortcuts, passwords and logins are different than my personal, so I needed to run a seperate instance of Chrome.

Google Chrome has a built in multiple profile feature, but it’s currently only in developer status (type “about:flags” into the address bar and then enable multiple profiles) (note: it was taken out of standard release just recently). Eventually this will be easy to achieve, but until then Google has very simple documentation on how to accomplish this outside of Chrome itself here.

Here are the steps (for Windows 7 but will work for Windows XP and Vista as well, note the target link will differ):

1) Create a new Google Chrome shortcut on your Desktop and rename it Business Chrome – create one more Google Chrome shortcut on your Desktop and leave it named as Google Chrome

2) Go to your C:\ drive and create a new folder called BusinessChrome

3) Right click the Google Chrome shortcut on your Desktop and go to properties. You’ll see something like the following listed under target:

C:\Users\YourName\AppData\Local\Google\Chrome\Application\chrome.exe

4) Add the following to the end of this [with a space] –user-data-dir=C:\BusinessChrome

So it should look something like this

C:\Users\YourName\AppData\Local\Google\Chrome\Application\chrome.exe –user-data-dir=C:\BusinessChrome

5) Click Apply and OK

6) Now double click the Business Chrome Shortcut

You should see a blank Google Chrome browser. Don’t worry you haven’t lost any of your Google Chrome bookmarks, they are still on your other Google Chrome Shortcut. Double click your Google Chrome shortcut on your Desktop (not the Business Chrome.) You should see your Chrome as it’s always been.

Customizing your new Chrome Profiles:

Change the Shortcut Icon:By right clicking on the Business Chrome shortcut you can click “change icon.” This will give you an option to pick from other default shortcuts. You may alternatively visit this website and download other neat Chrome icons. Simply download the icon and then put it into your C:\BusinessChrome folder and then browse to it to change the icon.

Change the Chrome Theme:

In Chrome > click the wrench icon > options > personal stuff > get themes Install a theme. This will help you differentiate which Chrome profile you are using.

I created three profiles for Chrome and put their shortcuts in my taskbar (see image below.) They each synch up with seperate Google accounts so that I can install Chrome on any computer and access my browsing data; this also keeps my Laptop and Desktop’s favorites synched up through Google’s cloud. Have questions? Comment below.

Multiple Chrome Profiles

(left to right) Business Chrome, Personal Chrome, Education Chrome

By: Jonathan Gibbons
Web Ventures Plus
Owner & Chief Webmaster