In the past few years, Google has been developing new specifications for building Chrome extensions. With the release of Chrome 88 earlier this year, Google launched Manifest v3 and promised a huge change in privacy protection. Today, Google announced the start of the transition from Manifest v2.
Google today announced a transitional upgrade plan to phase out Chrome extensions built to the Manifest v2 specification. On January 17, 2022, the Chrome Web Store will no longer accept new browser extensions built using the old method, but existing updates can still be submitted. In January 2023, the Chrome browser no longer supports the Manifest v2 specification at all, and it is impossible to submit updates to the old version.
Google wrote in the developer log:
As these dates approach, we will share more details about the changes to the Chrome version, as well as more information about extension developers and users that may be affected. Please refer to this page for more detailed timetable information, as more precise dates and milestone details appear, we will keep updating.
Before the launch of Chrome 88 in January this year, Google incorporated community feedback into Manifest v3, including changes in favor of ad blockers. The goal is to make extensions safer and more performant because they traditionally have a large number of browser and active visits.
In recent months, we have seen additional mechanisms for scripting APIs, supporting multiple static rule sets in declarative web request APIs, filtering based on tag IDs, and session scope rules.
