On August 31, 2026, Google removed the remaining Manifest V2 extensions from the Chrome Web Store, including uBlock Origin. Google’s own Manifest V2 timeline now records that date as the final store removal. The code had never left GitHub. What the catalog took away was the normal Chrome distribution path around the code.
A listing is more than a download button
A catalog entry is where a tool is discovered and trusted. It carries the package, automatic updates, install counts, ratings, reviews, screenshots, permission disclosures, and a stable installation path. Remove it and new users lose the normal route to the software. In this case the runtime changed too: Chrome disabled Manifest V2 everywhere with Chrome 138, and the enterprise escape hatch disappeared with Chrome 139. A preserved store package therefore does not restore normal operation in current Chrome.
Why uBlock Origin left
uBlock Origin did not disappear because its source vanished. It became incompatible with Chrome’s extension platform transition from Manifest V2 to Manifest V3. The current uBlock Origin repository explicitly notes that its Chrome Web Store listing was removed on August 31, 2026 while the full extension remains available for Firefox. A different project, uBlock Origin Lite, targets Manifest V3 with a reduced architecture suited to Chrome’s newer rules.
A precedent, not a novelty
None of this is new. Firefox 57 removed support for legacy XUL extensions, leaving preserved add-on files dependent on old Firefox versions or ports to the newer WebExtensions system. Catalog removal and runtime incompatibility are related problems, but they are not the same problem.
The parts that survive separately
An extension is at least three things: source code, a packaged artifact, and documentation. uBlock Origin’s source lives on GitHub, installable releases ship alongside it, and its wiki and filter lists live in their own repositories. None of it sat in the store. What the catalog controlled was the review history, the user base, the update channel, and a single trusted URL.
A preserved copy isn’t a working install
Holding a .crx or .xpi file is not having a working extension. The browser is the gatekeeper: current Chrome rejects MV2 outright, so even a faithfully archived copy is inert there; Firefox and older Chromium are what still run it. The extension also expects an update server and, on Firefox, a signed package — a sideloaded copy loses both. And uBlock Origin refreshes its block lists from several third-party hosts on a schedule, so an offline copy eventually blocks only whatever lists were last cached. For software whose whole job is to stop untrusted content, an unverified preserved copy also means trusting whoever packaged it — the kind of decision that deserves source you can inspect.
That is the real loss when an extension leaves its catalog: not the code, which survives wherever its project publishes it, but the context that made it discoverable, updatable, and trustworthy. A store listing was never a backup.