Can't connect to localhost from Chrome extension

[Steve Brush via StackOverflow]

If you're attempting to make a cross-domain request to localhost (with a port) from your background.js file, you'll need to update your local machine's host file with a pseudo-hostname, as demonstrated below. Chrome extensions don't like playing around with localhost for some reason, so you need to trick the extension into believing it's an actual domain.

etc/hosts file

127.0.0.1 localhost.com

manifest.json

"permissions": ["http://localhost.com/*"]

background.js (using jQuery)

$.post('http://localhost.com:5000/some-endpoint');

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[Steve Brush via StackOverflow]

You can use custom ports.

[Steve Brush via StackOverflow]

You can use custom ports.

manifest.json

"permissions": ["http://localhost/*"]

background.js (using jQuery)

$.post('http://localhost:5000/some-endpoint');