15

It is known that Chromium browser is now shipped as deb "Transitional package - chromium-browser -> chromium snap".

But this maybe not expected for some users and they want to get normal deb-based version. How does this possible?

N0rbert
  • 99,918

3 Answers3

14

If you are concerned about security, the most proper way to get updated Chromium without untested third party patches and without snap in Ubuntu 20.04 is to use official builds from 18.04, which will be supported until 2023.

For proper installation and future updates follow the steps.

Enable bionic-updates repo:

cat <<EOF | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/bionic-updates.list
# for deb-based chromium. Supported only 'til 2023
# see also /etc/apt/preferences.d/chromium-deb-bionic-updates
deb http://archive.ubuntu.com/ubuntu/ bionic-updates universe
EOF

Pin Chromium packages from this repo:

cat <<EOF | sudo tee /etc/apt/preferences.d/chromium-deb-bionic-updates
Package: chromium-browser chromium-browser-l10n chromium-codecs-ffmpeg-extra chromium-codecs-ffmpeg 
Pin: release a=bionic-updates
Pin-Priority: 900
EOF

And install packages:

sudo apt update
sudo apt install chromium-browser

Et voilà! Trusted and automatically updated environment without snap bastards.

BISI
  • 722
bvasiliev
  • 471
  • 1
    Chose this one. Worked perfectly (so far). Thanks! Just as an FYI, installing from source (https://chromium.googlesource.com/chromium/src/+/master/docs/linux/build_instructions.md) at the chromium.googlesource.com site installs 533 packages without asking, including snapd and other snap packages. So I purged all that. I tentatively leap to the conclusion that the "install-build-deps.sh" script that is part of the process detects ubuntu 20.04 and builds the containerized version. also without asking. sigh. – BISI Nov 12 '20 at 19:35
  • Fetch & authorize the repo GPG key with: curl -s 'https://keyserver.ubuntu.com/pks/lookup?op=get&search=0x790bc7277767219c42c86f933b4fe6acc0b21f32' | sudo apt-key add - – ulidtko Nov 11 '22 at 15:27
  • 1
    Missing GPG key can also be remediated by sudo apt-key adv --recv-keys --keyserver keyserver.ubuntu.com 3B4FE6ACC0B21F32 – Mike Jan 12 '23 at 18:56
  • Installing Chromium from bionic builds worked very well, but it's 2023 already so supposedly there will be no further updates. Do you have any advice what to do now? – Mike Jan 12 '23 at 18:57
9

It is possible by using a third-party repository (PPA) from LaunchPad, named Chromium Beta branch.

To install, one needs to add this repository to the system by:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:saiarcot895/chromium-beta

Then remove the snapped Chromium by:

snap remove chromium

and install the package with:

sudo apt-get install chromium-browser

To avoid the installation of the snap package in the future, one should do the following:

cat <<EOF | sudo tee /etc/apt/preferences.d/pin-chromium-deb
Package: *
Pin: release o=LP-PPA-saiarcot895-chromium-beta
Pin-Priority: 1337
EOF

To revert to the snap version, use:

sudo rm /etc/apt/preferences.d/pin-chromium-deb; sudo apt-get autopurge chromium-browser; snap install chromium
BeastOfCaerbannog
  • 14,585
N0rbert
  • 99,918
  • Only for info to "snap free" users like me. As I've completly removed snaps I had before "pin" the PPA and then install Chrominum. This is the sequence to follow for who removed compleatly snaps from their system. Thanks for sharing your good solution. – pat Oct 25 '20 at 10:50
  • 1
    If you prefer not trusting an additional party, the accepted answer to this https://askubuntu.com/questions/1179273/how-to-remove-snap-completely-without-losing-the-chromium-browser very similar question would be preferable. – Bruni Jun 08 '21 at 10:31
5
You can download latest official .deb build for Ubuntu 20.04 LTS (Focal), 21.04 (Hirsute), 21.10 (Impish), 22.04 LTS (Jammy) and 22.10 (Kinetic) here: https://launchpad.net/~phd/+archive/ubuntu/chromium-browser/

This is a PPA repository (maintained by me) with official Ubuntu packages released originally for Ubuntu 18.04 LTS (Bionic) and automatically updated as soon as a new version is released in the 18.04 repository.

UPDATE:

Since April 2023 Canonical does no longer provide Chromium .deb packages for any version of Ubuntu.
Hence THIS REPOSITORY WILL NO LONGER BE UPDATED.
You may want to switch to:
https://freeshell.de/phd/chromium

Piotr Henryk Dabrowski
  • 344
  • 2
  • 8