Google set to phase out Manifest V2 in a few days, breaking many ad blockers

Alfonso Maruccia

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The Year of Firefox: Google initially announced the Manifest V3 API in 2018, but the new extension technology was delayed several times because of the intrinsic limitations it imposed on ad blockers and security add-ons. Now that it is ready for release, Mountain View will begin phasing out Manifest V2 extensions in Chrome next month.

The massive migration from Manifest V2 to Manifest V3 is about to happen. Starting on June 3, newer Chrome versions in the browser's three development channels (Beta, Dev, Canary) will begin to see a "warning banner" stating that Manifest V2 extensions will soon no longer work.

Unsupported V2 extensions in the Chrome Web Store will lose their "Featured" badge on the same date. The rollout and discontinuance will accelerate in the coming months, with Google eventually disabling all Manifest V2 extensions. Chrome will direct users to Manifest V3 alternatives in the Chrome store automatically.

The search giant admits that sunsetting Manifest V2 is a significant change for Chrome's extension ecosystem, so the process will start with stable test builds first. Enterprise organizations using the "ExtensionManifestV2Availability" policy are exempt from the change until June 2025.

Google claims the new Manifest V3 API is more secure than its predecessor. However, many developers have expressed concern that the updated API imposes stricter limitations on security-related extensions. The new framework will essentially force popular add-ons like uBlock Origin (uBO) out of Chrome's ecosystem, leaving users with much less effective ad-blocking tools.

Developers confirmed (again) that uBlock Origin requires the Manifest V2 API to do its job effectively. The Manifest V3-based "uBlock Origin Lite" extension is far more limited and cannot work like uBlock Origin, regardless of how much they tweak it. Users can expect uBO Manifest V2 for Chrome to work for the next 1 to 3 months before Google breaks it.

Google states that the goal of Manifest V3 has always been clear: to "protect existing functionality" in the browser while improving security, privacy, and performance. The company says that over 85% of "actively maintained" extensions in the Chrome Web Store are running Manifest V3 now, which means that users have many filtering extensions to choose from, including AdBlock, Adblock Plus, uBlock Origin Lite, and AdGuard.

According to uBO developers, the "actively maintained" definition is questionable as many extensions don't require much maintenance to continue running. Chrome users will likely go through a significant disruption in their browsing experience for the next several months. Meanwhile, Mozilla said Firefox will continue supporting Manifest V2 extensions while implementing the best parts of the Manifest V3 API.

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I do hope that the solution most people lean towards is the one suggested and the one that I am using myself, Firefox.

However I think that if Firefox is not something that works out people should remember that they can continue to block ads out of principle: I'm sure most VPN services will start running piehole or some other dns-level ad blocker or some other ad-specific solution that would allow you to point your DNS to a filtering service that blocks all ads.

The important thing is that all people go the extra mile and make sure to continue to block ads so Google reverts this nonsense decision to make browsing not just more inherently annoying but also inherently far more unsafe due to not just annoying but usually malicious ads.
 
Firefox + uBlockOrigin (give the devs more credit, they're practically gods in terms of good karma!)
And not just that...
Privacy Badger and DecentralEyes
YouTube SponsorBlock and DeArrow as well as Youtube Redux and NonStop
Minimal theme for X, User Agent Spoofer alongside uBlacklist to remove AI imagery sites
You did this Sundar Pichai, I expect anyone who wants a minimal AdSense profile and a good YouTube experience to utilize these to their fullest, its one time, fire then forget.
 
Happy to not be using Google's (now confirmed) data farming browser, and I sure hope mozilla can wake up and stop trying to parrot Chrome in certain aspects of how they build Firefox, work on optimising it properly and it might force some people to switch (especially as in this case even the chromium browsers don't really have a choice)
 
I'm glad I use Edge. But the best ad blocker is to only visit trusted, clean sites. I don't see a problem with seeing one or two banners on sites where I really like the content.
Except if you are using "modern" Edge, it is still a Chromium based browser.

per https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-edge/extensions-chromium/developer-guide/manifest-v3
In October 2020, Microsoft announced the decision to embrace Manifest V3 to help reduce fragmentation of the web for all developers and enhance privacy, security, and performance for end users.
And they plan on following the timeline put out by Chrome.

Sadly while attempting to stick with well known, "trusted" websites when browsing the internet was a common practice/suggestion to protect yourself, nowadays it is quite easy for bad actors to inject malicious elements to otherwise benign websites.
 
I'm glad to see that my intuition about avoiding Google's Chrome (and Chromium-based) browsers has paid off.

Firefox certainly has it's issues, but a lot of them can be fixed with addons and plugins.
 
It really seems like MS wants people to stop using windows and Google wants people to stop using chrome.

Are we seeing the beginnings of an open source future because these companies are trying to cater to shareholders instead of users? You know, the people who's money goes to the shareholders?
 
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Are we seeing the beginnings of an open source future because these companies are trying to cater to shareholders instead of users.
You'd think they'd be smarter than this, but no. Microsoft and Google both have their collective heads in the sand & in their bumz and are unlikely to pull them out in time to do any good..
 
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I'm glad to see that my intuition about avoiding Google's Chrome (and Chromium-based) browsers has paid off.

Firefox certainly has it's issues, but a lot of them can be fixed with addons and plugins.
Brave is solid, but yeah, ff all the way. Or LibreWolf.
 
True, it really is.

Also a good alternate based off the Firefox engine.
I switch to Firefox in 2021 when I switch to Linux full time and chrome stopped linking saved accounts to chromium. I'm happy to say, all of the issues that made me switch from Firefox to chrome originally in the 2010's have been solved.
 
Jokes on them, I only use FireFox. And have been for nearly 20 years. Once FireFox finally got multi-threading, I never seem to know why people use Chrome.
 
I stopped using Firefox a long time ago, mainly because, browsers crashed a lot more back then, Firefox still hadn’t figured out how to crash a single tab instead of the entire browser.

Chrome came in crashing far less and able to recover a single tab.

I moved over to Microsoft Edge in the last few years because it was basically a better chrome, I assume these manifest changes will also affect Edge.

So it looks like I’m going back to Firefox, I do not mind this one bit, I’ll also help my family and friends move over to Firefox as I highly doubt any of them want their Ad Blockers to stop working.
 
I loathe Chrome and didn't even install the POS on my new PC build. I've been using FF for last 15 years. I don't even use Chrome on Android. Likewise, I also don't use Google search any more even though I have edited the search engine string to disable AI view and only return web view, why reward them by continuing to use their less than useless search crap. DuckDuckGo only now.

Hard to think of many companies I despise more than Google: maybe Monsanto and Exxon.
 
Dear Google,
SMART people use Firefox. The end.


Why did you stop using it?
Not OP but when Edge went chromium it was faster than Firefox for me at the time, but I switched back recently due to frustration with the Edge android app. It's buggy as hell and had useless AI copilot stuff added recently.

Firefox desktop seems to be faster nowadays thankfully, and the Android app is superb.
 
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I stopped using Firefox a long time ago, mainly because, browsers crashed a lot more back then, Firefox still hadn’t figured out how to crash a single tab instead of the entire browser.
What websites have YOU been going too?? I can count on one hand how many times Firefox has crashed for me in the last 10 years. Whatever was happening to make it crash for you was no fault of Firefox.
 
What websites have YOU been going too?? I can count on one hand how many times Firefox has crashed for me in the last 10 years. Whatever was happening to make it crash for you was no fault of Firefox.

I use Firefox for 20 years and it is the only one that can handle so many tabs and windows vs the rest. I mean a lot, like 1500+ tabs.
 
What websites have YOU been going too?? I can count on one hand how many times Firefox has crashed for me in the last 10 years. Whatever was happening to make it crash for you was no fault of Firefox.
We're talking 2004-2008 here, maybe I used Firefox up-till 2010? It was so long ago, I can't remember, but probably TechSpot, YouTube, BBC News, Various sites for work, Hotmail, Car Forums. Literally anything, any site at any random point in time would cause Firefox to crash, I still used Firefox because it was the least crashy vs IE.

Chrome came along and sorted all of that, I held onto Firefox for a couple more years but they just took way to long to sort it, so I switched.

I use Firefox for 20 years and it is the only one that can handle so many tabs and windows vs the rest. I mean a lot, like 1500+ tabs.
I'm nowhere near this level, maybe, at most, 30-40 tabs? But usually 10-15 tabs.

I'll happily go back to Firefox, I have absolutely no favourites in this game at all.
 
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