Floating toolbars are coming with Material 3 Expressive, but where are the bottom bars

Abner Li | May 18 2025 - 6:30 am PT

With Material 3 Expressive, Google is making a push for bottom controls in apps with toolbars. This new component displays “frequently used actions relevant to the current page.”

Google says to think of it as a “container with several slots.” There are a lot of ways that developers can customize it, with two types available:

Docked toolbar: “Spans the full width of the window. It’s best used for global actions that remain the same across multiple pages.”

It replaces the bottom app bar (what Google Tasks used before last year’s redesign), which is deprecated: “It should be replaced with the docked toolbar, which is very similar and more flexible.”

Floating toolbar: “Floats above the body content. It’s best used for contextual actions relevant to the body content or the specific page.”

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Apps can pair a floating toolbar and FAB together.
The redesigned Google Photos albums view will be using this component for share, add, and edit buttons. This results in a more fullscreen experience at the top of the page.
Floating toolbars can also be “used as tabs between related subsequent pages in the product hierarchy” as seen in Fitbit for a Day, Week, Month, and Year switcher.

These toolbars can be placed vertically on larger screens.
“Floating toolbars shouldn’t exceed the edge of the window or pane.” Apps with more actions can use an overflow menu.

Meanwhile, there are standard and vibrant color configurations:

Standard: “A low-emphasis color scheme best used for focusing attention on the body content.”
Vibrant: “A high-emphasis color scheme that draws attention to the controls. It can also indicate a temporary change in the page behavior, such as entering edit mode.”

Google says to not pair a toolbar and navigation bar (bottom bar) together: “Show the navigation bar on primary pages, and toolbars on subsequent pages with actions.” In the case of a hypothetical email app:

That raises the question of the floating navigation/bottom bar. As of today, such a component does not exist in Material 3 Expressive. This is despite its continued presence in Google Chat, while one M3E mockup shows such a design. It could always come in a future M3E expansion/update.