There are over 132,000 extensions available for Google Chrome. Recently, Google started showing this message on many pages in their Chrome Extension Store:
Why is Google displaying this message?
On July 10th, Google published a blog post titled, "What's happening in Chrome extensions?"
In this post, they announced that they are "warning users that Manifest Version 2 extensions will soon go away" (by showing messages like the one above).
Think of an extension manifest like an operating system version. "Manifest v2" extensions were like "Windows 10," and Google now wants everyone to switch to "Windows 11."
Google started phasing out Manifest v2 extensions back in 2022. This is the "final countdown," and Google is essentially saying: Either upgrade or get out of our store.
Many extensions will be kicked out by the end of 2024
I've been browsing through the Chrome Web Store and found that this message appears on many extensions for almost every keyword I type.
These aren’t just obscure extensions with a few users; many have tens of thousands of users.
Here are a few examples:
The developers of these extensions have likely ignored two years of Google’s emails urging them to upgrade to Manifest v3. They also spent weeks ignoring this message on their extension page. It's safe to say that these extensions will be kicked out from the Web Store by the end of 2024.
The Opportunity for Bootstrapped Founders
Find a popular extension that's about to "expire" and create a version of that extension in Manifest v3.
Chrome extensions are open-source by default, which means you don’t have to start from scratch; you can easily inspect the extension’s source code.
Additionally, you can use an AI tool like Claude or ChatGPT to help you create a V3 version of the extension (feed the source code and ask for a refactor). I’ve found that Claude is particularly good at creating boilerplates and can code the logic/interface for any Chrome extension with minimal errors.
Once you create the extension (and do some basic promotion), Google will likely start recommending it under the "Try one of these alternatives" section for V2 extensions:
Good luck!
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