Google is strongly promoting the controversial Manifest V3 extension and will phase out the Manifest V2 extension in June of next year.
Recently, Google Chrome has officially announced that it is again postponing the phase-out of the Manifest V2 extension, saying that it will provide developers with a solution to the migration challenge through new features, bug fixes, and sufficient adoption time.
Google said that extension developers are using the Offscreen Documents API (added in Chrome 109) to mitigate the former and are actively seeking solutions to the latter, after issues arose during the migration process, such as Service Worker’s inability to use DOM functionality and hard limits on its lifespan.
As a result, Google has postponed all experiments in January and will also evaluate all downstream milestone releases. Google said it expects to hear more about the updated phase-out plan and timeline by March 2023, so the current Manifest V2 phase-out date becomes TBD.
Other major web browsers are also starting to adapt to the Manifest V3 extension standard, and Microsoft Edge browser has decided to follow Google’s lead and start phasing out Manifest V2 while advancing Manifest V3.
Firefox will fully embrace Manifest V3 by the end of 2022, and the new feature is currently in beta. Starting November 21, 2022, Firefox will be open for submissions of Manifest V3 extensions, and the timing of Manifest V2’s abandonment will be announced after subsequent evaluation.
It is worth noting that one of the most controversial changes in MV3 is the removal of the Web Request API to support the new Declarative Net Request API. This change was heavily criticized by developers, including Google Chrome, for taking away the functionality and reducing the efficiency of many extensions. Mozilla has chosen to keep the Web Request API while also supporting declarative net requests.
