In December of last year, we paused the planned deprecation of Manifest V2 in order to address developer feedback and deliver better solutions to migration issues. As a result of this feedback, we’ve made a number of changes to Manifest V3 to close these gaps, including: Introducing Offscreen Documents, which provide DOM access for extensions to use in a variety of scenarios like audio playback Providing better control over service worker lifetimes for extensions calling extension APIs or receiving events over a longer period of time Adding a new User Scripts API, which allows userscript mana ..read more

Over the past year, we have been actively involved in discussions with the vendors behind several content blocking extensions around ways to improve the MV3 extensions platform. Based on these discussions, many of which took place in the WebExtensions Community Group (WECG) in collaboration with other browsers, we have been able to ship significant improvements. # More static rulesets Sets of filter rules are usually grouped into lists. For example, a more generic list could contain rules applicable to all users while a more specific list may hide location-specific content that only some users ..read more

With the recent introduction of the Document Picture-in-Picture API (and even before), web developers are increasingly interested in being able to automatically open a picture-in-picture window when the user switches focus from their current tab. This is especially useful for video conferencing web apps, where it allows presenters to see and interact with participants in real time while presenting a document or using other tabs or windows. A picture-in-picture window opened and closed automatically when user switches tabs. # Enter picture-in-picture automatically To support these video confere ..read more

Just over a year ago the Chrome Aurora team launched the Angular NgOptimizedImage directive. The directive is focused primarily on improving performance, as measured by the Core Web Vitals metrics. It bundles common image optimizations and best practices into a user-facing API that’s not much more complicated than a standard <img> element. In 2023, we've enhanced the directive with new features. This post describes the most substantial of those new features, with an emphasis on why we chose to prioritize each feature, and how it can help improve the performance of Angular applications ..read more

Service workers are a powerful tool for allowing websites to work offline and create specialized caching rules for themselves. A service worker fetch handler sees every request from a page it controls, and can decide if it wants to serve a response to it from the service worker cache, or even rewrite the URL to fetch a different response entirely—for instance, based on local user preferences. However, there can be a performance cost to service workers when a page is loaded for the first time in a while and the controlling service worker isn't currently running. Since all fetches need to happen ..read more

Earlier this year Chrome shipped CSS nesting in 112, and it's now in each major browser. Browser support Chrome 112, Supported 112 Firefox 117, Supported 117 Edge 112, Supported 112 Safari 16.5, Supported 16.5 Source However, there was one strict and potentially unexpected requirement to the syntax, listed in the first article of the invalid nesting examples. This follow up article will cover what has changed in the spec, and from Chrome 120. # Nesting element tag names One of the most surprising limitations in the first release of CSS nesting syntax, was the inability to nest bare element t ..read more

WebGPU is often perceived as a web graphics API that grants unified and fast access to GPUs by exposing cutting-edge hardware capabilities and enabling rendering and computation operations on a GPU, analogous to Direct3D 12, Metal, and Vulkan. However, WebGPU transcends the boundaries of a mere JavaScript API; it is a fundamental building block akin to WebAssembly, with implications that extend far beyond the web due to its burgeoning ecosystem. The Chrome team acknowledges WebGPU as more than just web technology; it’s a thriving ecosystem centered around a core technology. # Exploring the cur ..read more

The default durability mode in IndexedDB is changing from relaxed to strict from Chrome 121. This adjustment is to enhance performance and to align with other major browsers like Firefox and Safari. The blog post explains the details of this change and what it means for web developers. # IndexedDB durability modes IndexedDB, a powerful web API for storing large amounts of structured data, offers two durability modes for readwrite transactions: strict: this mode explicitly instructs the OS to flush changes to disk before issuing the complete event. relaxed this mode relies on default OS flushi ..read more

It’s been a busy year for the Chrome Extensions team. With yesterday’s Chrome 120 Beta release, the extensions platform is making another big step forward. For an overview on what’s happened this year, check out our quarterly updates from July and October. Read on for what's new in Chrome 120 for Extensions. # Closing the platform gap With the release of Chrome 120, we will close the remaining platform gaps listed on our Manifest V3 known issues page. The new userScript API as well as support for file handling on ChromeOS have been the two remaining items on the list that we can now cross off ..read more

Unless otherwise noted, changes described below apply to the newest Chrome beta channel release for Android, ChromeOS, Linux, macOS, and Windows. Learn more about the features listed here through the provided links or from the list on chromestatus.com. Chrome 120 is beta as of November 1, 2023. You can download the latest on Google.com for desktop or on Google Play Store on Android. # CSS This release adds seven new CSS features. # CSS <image> syntax for registered custom properties Supports using the <image> syntax for custom properties registered with @property or registerPropert ..read more