Critical Issue in the New Extension Popup UI: Regular Users Will Struggle to Use Extensions After Installation!

[Jack Mcintyre]

Hi Oliver and Patrick!

First of all, we'd like to express our appreciation for your efforts in developing the Chrome ecosystem.

However, the new extension popup UI makes it significantly harder for users to find and use an extension after installation, especially if they need it frequently:

What’s the issue?

We've been in the extension market since 2017, with a total audience of over 1 million users.

We clearly remember when the puzzle icon was introduced, hiding all installed extensions. Since then, users have had to pin extensions manually for them to appear in Chrome.

Based on our statistics, we can confidently state that between 10% and 50% of users (depending on the product) fail to find the extension after installation because it gets hidden under the puzzle icon. 

Here’s how it works: After installation, users see the following window:

If a user misclicks even once outside this window, the extension gets hidden under the puzzle icon. From that point on, an average user will struggle to figure out where to find the product they just installed.

We are not making assumptions—this is based on thousands of direct user reports received in our support chat on the Welcome Page (which opens immediately after extension installation), saying:

• “I don’t know where to find the product.”
• “I don’t know how to use it.”

This issue started specifically after the introduction of the puzzle icon.

As a workaround, we had to add a section to our Welcome Page explaining how to pin the extension after installation. However, this solution is far from perfect — many users still don’t understand why their installed extension has just "disappeared."

The new UI makes this problem even worse!

Right now, many users don’t realize they need to look under the puzzle icon and manually pin the extension.

As we understand, the pin button will now be buried under the three-dot menu:

This will make things even harder for regular users because they will now have to:

1. Realize that the installed extension is hidden under the puzzle icon.
2. Click on the puzzle icon and find the extension in the list.
3. Understand that the pin button is now under a three-dot menu.
4. Open the three-dot menu and select "Pin."

Users won’t be able to find the pin button easily, and without the pin functionality, any popup or sidebar extension cannot be accessed frequently in a convenient way.

Again, this is not just speculation—users already struggle to find the pin button in the current UI, and we receive numerous reports about this. The new UI will make the situation even worse for them.

P.S. We also fully support concerns raised here by other developers:

• Less than 0.1% of users have ever reported struggling to find site permissions or needing them.
• Yet, the new UI prioritizes site permissions while making the pin button much harder to access.

Proposed Solutions

Option 1: If you insist on emphasizing site permissions, please do not hide the pin button under a three-dot menu. For example, place it where the on/off button is now and move the on/off button to the three-dot menu, as users need to disable extensions far less frequently than they need to pin them:

• Many popup and sidebar extensions will become completely unusable for regular users if they cannot easily pin them.

Option 2: The simplest and best solution—pin extensions by default after installation.

• This was the standard before the puzzle icon was introduced, and it worked perfectly.
• The puzzle icon can remain, providing additional functionality by listing all extensions, with the pin/unpin option inside the three-dot menu. However, extensions should be pinned by default after installation.

Why is pinning by default the best approach?

• It’s logical—when a user installs a product, they expect to see it.
• If they don’t need it, they can unpin or uninstall it.
• Hiding a newly installed product is completely counterintuitive—it’s like installing a mobile app and having it automatically placed inside a grayed-out "Installed Apps" folder.

On behalf of the entire developer community, we kindly ask you to consider this change. Our concerns are not based on personal opinions but on direct, widespread user feedback confirming that users struggle to find installed extensions.

If making extensions visible by default after installation is not an option, please do not hide the pin button inside the three-dot menu.

Thank you for your attention!

[Alexei Miagkov]

As another million+ user extension developer, I completely agree. Unpinning by default was a blow to extension usability. This new menu compounds the mistake.

We speak from experience. Whatever studies Google conducted were clearly in the service of bad ideas. For example, the focus group task is to disable site access everywhere except for this one site. Oh, the version of the menu that surfaces the permission dropdown won out. Completely divorced from real world concerns.

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[Oliver Dunk]

Hi both,

Thanks so much for sharing your concerns. Before I joined Google, I was also working on large extensions that were impacted by the pinning change - so I completely appreciate that this can make it harder to onboard users. At the same time, I hope you can appreciate that this isn't something that was done without consideration, and given that, we want to take time to see if there are benefits to the new UI as well. I know it can sometimes feel like the chances of any changes after something is built are slim, but we really are open to them. That's why we've been specifically calling out that this is a work in progress design whenever we talk about it.

At the moment, I'm focusing on making sure all of the feedback in the mailing list is passed along. Once there are more concrete UI changes that have been made I'll make sure to share those as well.

Less than 0.1% of users have ever reported struggling to find site permissions or needing them.

This is what I would expect, but I do want to reiterate that the goal with these changes is to change behavior. Of course, we want to make sure the primary actions users have in mind are easy to access. At the same time, compared to other platforms the way extensions get access to user data is very permissive. I think it's really important that we continue to mature there and part of that is going to be exposing more controls to users. Such a small percentage of users looking for these permissions seems like a clear sign that the model we have today isn't giving users a proper understanding of what access extensions have. I'm sure that more than 0.1% of users would choose not to run certain extensions on their banking sites, for example.

Just to reiterate, I'm not trying to disagree here. I think it can be the case that there are improvements to be had with the permissions model, and that pinning is still an important functionality we want to be discoverable. It is just a tricky case of finding the right balance.

Thanks again for all of the feedback - as I mentioned we'll keep passing it on.

Oliver Dunk | DevRel, Chrome Extensions | https://developer.chrome.com/ | London, GB

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/a/chromium.org/d/msgid/chromium-extensions/CAOcx_p8AdF09a7SZVD_OzAQ8atBH%2BV0qXHWeT1JBqcw9xBF5rQ%40mail.gmail.com.

[Donald Jacobs]

I fully support this. The key advantage of browser extensions is the ability to open them instantly with one click. But that’s impossible if they aren’t pinned. 

Making the pin functionality even harder to find will seriously damage the extension ecosystem because users simply won’t realize that they can pin extensions at all.

Almost no one will repeatedly go into the puzzle icon just to launch an extension.

[Maksim]

Unfortunately, we can't boast as many users of our extensions as the topic starter, but we support the questions and concerns they have raised.

Previously, users had a clear visual cue—after clicking the Install button, the extension icon would immediately appear in the extensions bar. Now, however, the fix can be hidden far away, and many extensions don’t modify the interface of web pages but instead provide additional functionality in their own window, which is launched by clicking the icon.

If the primary motivation for changing the interface is to enhance user safety (which is undoubtedly important to the entire community), I’m confident that the Chrome Web Store team together with the developers of popular extensions would be able to find right solutions that won’t negatively impact access to the extensions themselves.

[woxxom]

> I'm sure that more than 0.1% of users would choose not to run certain extensions on their banking sites, for example.

Yes, but a more practical and meaningful solution would be to ask the users explicitly to specify their banking sites, then disable extensions there by default with a simple icon that opens the UI to customize those excluded sites. There is no conceptual need for the users to always have the site customization UI enabled by default. Your team's vision of a user's workflow isn't particularly practical.

>  I think it's really important that we continue to mature there and part of that is going to be exposing more controls to users. 

Being sophisticated and elaborating on minutiae verbosely doesn't make one mature, it only serves to create a false impression of maturity, while obfuscating lack of practical understanding and common sense. In general, maturity rather manifests as an ability to take a step back to rethink the approach and see if there was a mistake. Here, this word suspiciously looks like a new corporate buzzword.

Force-educating users is a rather condescending idea and we've all seen how "well" it worked in the entertainment industry where multiple teams explicitly stated a goal of educating their user base. It also doesn't help that the UI you proposed is cryptic for non-technically savvy people, which constitute and will arguably always constitute the overwhelming majority of users.

I think extension authors should have more say and more involvement. Currently there's almost none and all decisions are made non-transparently. WECG is a step in the right direction but compared to the web platform groups/forums/discussions its impact and relevancy is like a million times less.

[Cuyler Stuwe]

I think what’s really missing here is an understanding of the basic psychology of everyday users.

The average nontechnical user generally either trusts an extension implicitly, or they don’t. This isn’t an outcome of how interfaces are; It’s a result of how most people are fundamentally wired. If someone thinks it looks sketchy ahead of time, they simply won’t install it in the first place. If something gives them the creeps at some point after installing it, they’ll disable or uninstall it rather than limiting permissions. It just makes no sense whatsoever to keep something around if you don’t feel you can trust it.

Users who are at least somewhat technically saavy have a different reason for this “all or nothing” trust system — It’s almost impossible to tell what access an extension “actually needs” in order to do its job. For example, a “dark mode” extension absolutely needs the permission “access all of your data on your Chase banking site” in order to inject content scripts to apply theming there. We understand that the nature of how web apps are built tends to make it almost impossible to create a super granular permission system.

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[Alexei Miagkov]

Agreed!! Also: Have you all noticed how much third-party tracking exists on a typical banking site? I think it's funny that bank sites are the go-to example for selectively disabling your extensions.

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/a/chromium.org/d/msgid/chromium-extensions/CA%2BYuxddYG4qbQkUryXgdCmGW6YU7Vfk3H2P4NjDh6BSic66JQw%40mail.gmail.com.

[hrg...@gmail.com]

I can say with absolute certainty that most users don't know what "disabling" an extension means.

Computer savvy users realize that disabling an extension has the same practical effect as uninstalling it. And this is exactly the problem: In practice it's the same thing!!

The difference between disabling and uninstalling is so subtle that average users will never figure it out by themselves.

One wise rule about GUIs says: Avoid giving users multiple ways of doing the same thing. This is because they will naturally assume there's a difference between each way, when in fact there isn't, and therefore it's confusing for them.

For example,  many people believe there's a difference between clicking on the "X" on the top-right corner of the window (the close button) versus clicking on the 3-dot menu and then "Exit".

There is a difference only if you have multiple windows. Otherwise, it's the same thing. Most people won't get it... "Closing" and "Existing" can be the same thing or different things depending on the situation.

Because of that, the concept of disabling an extension will forever be confusing for average users. It's just a tricky concept by nature.

Therefore, the wise thing to do is to hide the "disable" checkbox from the average user. Making that checkbox more visible will only confuse them. They will not figure out that disabling an extension is the same thing as uninstalling it.

[AV Chrono]

I actually agree here. As you keep or enhance the permission controls the way you want them, but PIN a newly installed extension by DEFAULT. A user who has installed something wants to use it next, not find it next. The user does get an option to un-pin through a right-click (which is intuitive). And when an extension is un-pinned, give a (generic) visual "How to pin it back" if the user so desires.   

[Jack Mcintyre]

Hi Oliver,

Thank you for your response and for taking the time to address our concerns. We really appreciate the transparency in this process.

We strongly agree with Cuyler Stuwe’s point that users generally either trust an extension implicitly, or they don’t. If they have doubts beforehand, they simply won’t install it. If they lose trust in it later, they’ll uninstall or disable it rather than adjusting permissions. For most users, it just doesn’t make sense to keep something installed if they don’t fully trust it.

We also hope that if improving the permissions model remains a priority, it won’t come at the cost of making the pin functionality even harder to discover. The pinning experience is already not intuitive, and any further reduction in visibility would make it even more difficult for users to find and use their extensions effectively.

A simple and effective solution to ensure both the permissions model and pinning functionality work well together would be to have extensions pinned by default. This way, users can still easily access and interact with them while maintaining the improved permission controls.

Thank you again for your response. We look forward to further updates and improvements that make Chrome a better and more user-friendly platform.

[George Malson]

I'm following this issue too! Many users of my extensions report that they can't find the extension after installing it.

They waste time searching for the icon hidden behind the puzzle menu, and I have to create extra instructions just to show them where it is.

This new UI makes things harder instead of improving usability. Please reconsider this change.

[Alexander Strelnikov]

We're 100% behind these concerns.

Our experience shows that when users can't see their installed extension right away (because it's hiding under the puzzle icon or somewhere else), they think it didn't install properly.

Moving the pin button even further out of sight would totally break the whole extension installation experience.

[Likely Logic]

Why there isn't just a "Pin this extension" toggle in the install popup itself, I do not know.

The user could toggle it and see their extension show and hide.

Could even have this in the manifest, like "suggested shortcut key".

Or maybe extensions are pinned by default only when there is a browser action.