About Chrome’s “These extensions may soon no longer be supported” message

When you update Google Chrome to the latest version, you may notice a new section when you manage installed extensions in the browser.

Google now displays extensions that may soon no longer work in Chrome. Called These extensions may soon no longer be supported, you find these listed at the top of the Extensions page of the browser.

These two extensions are outdated according to Google and will stop working in the future

Tip: you can load chrome://extensions/ in the browser’s address bar to check it out.

If you do not have any extensions installed in Chrome, you do not have to worry about anything. If you do, there is a chance that some of them may stop working later this year.

Here are the details:

Google is changing the capabilities of browser extensions in Chrome.
Old extensions that do not get upgraded to the new system will stop working once Google drops support for the classic extensions system.
Not all extensions can be or will be migrated to the new system.

The change impacts content blocking extensions more than most other types of extensions. While content blockers remain available for Chrome and other Chromium-based browsers, they may not offer all the functionality of the current generation of content blockers.

Extensions that are no longer in active development may stop working, as they won’t be compatible. Some may be forked and updated, others will be gone forever.

Google changing the technology that extensions may use

Google started to implement the changes, called Manifest V3, in Chrome Canary 80 in 2019. Since then, it has added them to all versions of Chrome, but has not enabled them strictly in the latest Chrome Stable releases.

In other words, Chrome Stable supports both systems right now, but this changes later this year. Google suggests to remove or replace the extensions that are not compatible, but there is no need to rush.

For now, it is a good idea to keep an eye on these extensions. Some may be upgraded so that they are compatible with the new extensions system. Others may not, but you still have options to replace them when that happens.

Another option is to switch to a browser that continues to support these extensions. Since all Chromium-based browsers are affected by the change, it is mostly Firefox or a Firefox fork that is the go-to browser.

Firefox will support the classic extensions system and the new extensions system, giving users and extension developers the best of both worlds.

If you want full uBlock Origin functionality, for instance, you will get that only with Firefox in the future. You can switch to uBlock Origin Lite, but it lacks some of the features of the full uBlock Origin.

Other browsers based on Chromium will — likely — introduce similar warnings soon. Browsers like Microsoft Edge, Opera, Vivaldi, or Brave, are all based on Chromium.

Closing Words

Google is pushing the change and all others that base their browsers on Chromium will follow. It will be interesting to see if the change will convince some Chrome users to switch to a different browser. If their favorite extensions stop working, and if there is no suitable alternative, it is possible that this is going to happen.

All in all, it seems unlikely that even such a move is denting Google’s almost monopolistic hold on the browser market.

Are you affected by the change? Do you have found suitable alternatives for extensions that will no longer run in Chromium-based browsers? Feel free to leave a comment down below.

Summary