Microsoft Edge begins phasing out Manifest V2, spelling the end for full uBlock Origin

[Terry]

Microsoft has begun the process of ending support for Manifest V2, the older browser extension platform that powers uBlock Origin and most other traditional ad blockers in Edge, making it the last mainstream Chromium browser to complete this transition after Chrome fully disabled MV2 for all users back in July 2025

According to Microsofts own Edge blog, only 58 MV2 extensions on the entire Edge Add-on Store still have meaningful usage, and of those, just three dont already have a Manifest V3 replacement available, the company frames this as evidence the ecosystem has genuinely already moved on, with 95 percent of the stores most used MV2 extensions having already migrated to the newer platform ahead of this enforcement

The rollout is genuinely gradual and staged, notices are starting this month on the Manage Extensions page and store listings, beginning in Edges Canary, Dev and Beta preview channels before eventually widening to the Stable version most people actually use, Microsofts stated goal is completing the consumer transition by the end of 2026, with enterprise users and managed devices getting a longer runway until early 2027, managed devices specifically wont be touched at all during the initial consumer rollout phase

The extension most directly affected is the original uBlock Origin, which depends on capabilities that Manifest V3 simply doesnt allow in the same way, its blocking web requests approach gets replaced under MV3 with a more limited declarative rules system, the recommended replacement is uBlock Origin Lite, the MV3 compatible version of the same filter lists, which blocks most ads and trackers out of the box but with meaningfully fewer fine grained controls than the original offered, Microsoft argues the underlying MV3 architecture reduces real security risks from persistent background pages, remotely hosted extension code and runtime traffic modification

Privacy advocates including the Electronic Frontier Foundation have pushed back on this framing for years, arguing MV3 functions as a backdoor for trackers that favors the ad tech industry over genuine user control regardless of the security justification Microsoft and Google offer, for now, Firefox still fully supports MV2 in its stable releases, and both Brave and Vivaldi have said theyll keep MV2 alive as an option too, meaning the fragmenting landscape increasingly splits into Chromium browsers with restricted extension APIs on one side and non Chromium browsers preserving the older, more powerful extension capabilities on the other

Microsoft Edge is about to lock out older ad blockers, just like Chrome didwww.theverge.com

[MidTable]

Edge being locked into following Chromes extension policy timeline because its built on the same underlying engine is the real structural story here, Microsoft doesnt actually have independent control over this decision the way a fully separate browser like Firefox does

[Saka31]

uBlock Origin Lite blocking most ads and trackers out of the box but with fewer fine grained controls is a fair summary of the tradeoff, most casual users probably wont notice much difference but power users who relied on custom filter lists and advanced rules are going to feel this loss directly

[DQ Eric]

The EFF calling MV3 a backdoor for trackers is a genuinely serious accusation worth taking seriously given their track record on these issues, the security justification Microsoft and Google offer doesnt fully address the concern that the same restrictions limiting malicious extensions also happen to limit the most effective ad and tracker blocking capability