Chrome, Edge, Brave: an honest update on where Yad runs

YAD started on Chrome. That was the whole browser story for a while: build the extension, load the companion app, ship it to the Chrome Web Store, done. It works, it is live, you can check it yourself.

This week that changed, so here is exactly what changed and what did not.

Edge submission

Today we submitted YAD to Microsoft Edge Add-ons through Partner Center. Status right now: in review. Microsoft's own estimate is about seven working days before we hear back. So Edge is not live yet. It is submitted. There is a difference, and I am not going to blur it.

Brave, actually tested

Brave is different. We did not assume it would just work because Brave is Chromium under the hood. We installed Brave, loaded the built extension in an isolated test profile, and checked it through Chrome DevTools Protocol. Two things had to be true: the extension needed to get the exact same extension ID in Brave as it has in Chrome, and a real native messaging call from inside the extension needed to actually start the local Companion app on the machine, not just log something in a browser console. Both checked out, confirmed at the operating system level.

Because of that, Brave needs no separate store submission. Brave uses the Chrome Web Store directly. The moment someone on Brave clicks Add to Chrome, they get the same extension we already tested and already ship.

Why this took separate work at all

Chrome, Edge and Brave all run on Chromium, so it is fair to ask why this was not one job finished in one afternoon. The answer is that every browser store runs its own review process with its own rules, even when the underlying browser engine is identical. A concrete example: Microsoft's store rejected a manifest field that Chrome's store accepts without complaint. Nothing about what the extension does was different. It was a store rule, not a functional one. That is the kind of small, boring difference that eats a day if you are not looking for it.

What is not done

Firefox uses a different extension format entirely, and it is not on the schedule as finished work right now. Safari is blocked for a plainer reason: building for Safari requires a Mac with Apple's own developer tools, and we do not have one available at the moment. I would rather say that plainly than let the page imply more browsers than we have actually verified.

Why bother writing this down

None of this is a big announcement. It is three small, checkable facts: Chrome is live, Edge is submitted and waiting on Microsoft, Brave is tested and confirmed working today. That is what a browser-agent company should sound like when it talks about itself. Not a promise about tomorrow. A record of what was actually verified today, including the parts that are not finished yet.

That is the whole update.