Firefox keeps supporting powerful privacy extensions while Chrome deprecates them
Mozilla says it will continue supporting important Manifest V2 features that are required for popular ad blockers – such as uBlock Origin – and other privacy tools to work. Some Chrome users are already losing access to these features as Google phases out Manifest V2.
Image by Cybernews.
Mozilla says it will continue supporting important Manifest V2 features that are required for popular ad blockers – such as uBlock Origin – and other privacy tools to work. Some Chrome users are already losing access to these features as Google phases out Manifest V2.
Mozilla has announced its approach to changes introduced by Google that are associated with Manifest V3, the latest version of the extensions platform used by major browsers.
Firefox will support both Manifest V2 and V3 and will not limit any extensions. Users will be able to continue using uBlock Origin or any other privacy tool that relies on the previous Manifest V2.
“There are no limits on your extensions with Firefox,” Mozilla said.
This stance is different from Google’s, which is gradually phasing out the Manifest V2 and deprecating many powerful browser extensions, including popular ad blockers and privacy tools.
Cybernews has reported that many users have lost access to uBlockOrigin, the most popular adblocker relying on the Manifest V2.
“Google began phasing out Manifest V2 last year and plans to end support for extensions built on it by mid-2025. That change has real consequences: Chrome users are already losing access to uBlock Origin, one of the most popular ad blockers, because it relies on a Manifest V2 feature called blockingWebRequest,” Mozilla explains.
With V3, Chrome extensions are forced to handle web requests differently by replacing “blockingWebRequest” with “declarativeNetRequest.” This limits extensions' flexibility and the ability to block or modify web requests and filter content directly.
“Firefox, however, will continue supporting both blockingWebRequest and declarativeNetRequest – giving developers more flexibility and keeping powerful privacy tools available to users,” Mozilla assures. “Since APIs define what extensions can and can’t do inside a browser, restricting certain APIs can limit what types of extensions are possible.”
Mozilla argues that people must have the ability to shape the internet and their own experiences on it, as stated in their mission. Half of Firefox users have installed at least one extension, “from privacy tools to productivity boosters.”
For developers, Firefox has introduced a broader range of APIs, including new AI functionality that allows extensions to run offline machine learning tasks directly in the browser.
Some other browsers, such as Brave, also continue to support Manifest V2 extensions.
“For as long as we’re able (and assuming the cooperation of the extension authors), Brave will continue to support some privacy-relevant MV2 extensions – specifically AdGuard, NoScript, uBlock Origin, and uMatrix,” Brave said last year.