Brave ad-blocking browser moves to Chromium codebase, now supports Chrome extensions but says it won't integrate any Google-based features
Catalin Cimpanu / ZDNet : Tweets: @campuscodi and @nathonsecurity Tweets: Catalin Cimpanu / @campuscodi : Brave ditches Muon UI and goes full Chromium. Gets 22% speed boost and support for Chrome extensions. http://www.zdnet.com/... http://twitter.com/... Nathan / @nathonsecurity : Wow, okay, Brave is far better than it used to be. Importing from other browsers isn't laggy now, dev console can be docked, and it's noticeably much faster. Great move tbh. http://twitter.com/...
Context & Ripple Effects
Brave has spent 2018 building out a privacy-first browser on its own Muon codebase — most recently the Tor-powered Private Tabs beta in June. Moving to Chromium trades that independence for compatibility: a reported 22% speed boost, dockable dev tools, lag-free imports, and access to the entire Chrome extension catalog.
The move lands in a browser market where ad-blocking is already a competitive wedge — Opera shipped native ad-blocking back in 2016 claiming a 45% speed edge over Chrome with AdBlock Plus — and where Google itself is about to ship a Chrome-wide ad blocker aligned to the Coalition for Better Ads. Brave's bet is that it can ride Chromium's engine while refusing Google's feature layer.
First-order effects
- Brave users immediately gain Chrome extension support and faster performance, removing the two biggest practical objections to switching from Chrome.
- Brave's own engineers stop maintaining the Muon fork, redirecting effort from engine upkeep to the privacy and ad-blocking features that differentiate the product.
Second-order effects
- Ad-blocking extension developers now target a single dominant codebase, which strengthens the position of blockers like uBlock-style tools inside Brave rather than forcing per-browser ports.
- Google faces an awkward dynamic: its open-source engine powers a browser whose explicit pitch is rejecting Google services, just as Chrome's own Coalition-aligned ad blocker blurs the line between Chrome and ad-blocking rivals.
Third-order effects
- If more independent browsers follow Brave onto Chromium, browser competition shifts from rendering engines to the privacy, ads, and identity layers built on top — leaving Google as the de facto infrastructure provider for products positioned against it.
- The pattern points toward consolidation of the browser market around one engine, raising the stakes for whoever governs Chromium's roadmap and what features ship in it by default.
The trend: Independent browsers are abandoning proprietary engines for Chromium, relocating competition from rendering technology to privacy and ad-blocking layers atop a shared Google-controlled base.