Google is in the process of rolling out a pretty nifty update for its Chrome Beta app for Android, which includes an improved autocomplete experience for payments, the ability to create Web App shortcuts, and much more.

This upgrade allows its users to create a shortcut hyperlinked to a webpage and add it to their Android homescreen. Once the shortcut is clicked, the website is launched in a dedicated fullscreen browser, without all of the standard navigation controls. Here’s what Google had to say about this new feature:

Sites launched in this way will open in a normal Chrome for Android window, unless they include themobile-web-app-capable meta tag. Those sites will instead open in a special fullscreen Chrome for Android window that doesn’t display tabs, buttons, menus, or the Omnibox. Try adding a shortcut to weight.aerotwist.com to see this in action.

In addition to the re-vamped homescreen shortcuts, Chrome for Android Beta 31 also brings a multitude of bug fixes which are aimed at providing a smoother experience when using the autocomplete function for payments. Here’s what Google had to say about requestAutocomplete():

requestAutocomplete() makes it easier for users to fill out online forms by offering web developers programmatic access to the browser’s autocomplete information (with the user’s explicit permission). For this first release, we’ve made it work for web payments. On sites with requestAutocomplete(), users will be able to either use their existing payment data stored with the browser or enter new details through a browser-provided interface.

Incorporated in this beta release are a handful of other features and improvements, including; new Chrome Web App APIs, Speech Recognition with the JavaScript Web Speech API and the ability for developers to execute native code with Portable Native Client.

To find out more about the Chrome for Android beta – click the source link below.

• SourceChromium