Bare

Bare is a de-Googled Chromium build for Android, designed to give you more privacy, control and freedom on the web. It strips Google tracking, telemetry and AI integration while keeping powerful features like browser extensions and uBlock Origin. Bare also adds background video playback, the ability to save media from sites that normally block it, support for choosing your preferred download manager, and much more.

It is a patch series rather than a fork: 164 patches against one pinned revision of Chromium Desktop Android, so what this repository holds is exactly the difference between stock Chromium and Bare, and nothing else.

Built and used on a Pixel 10 Pro XL. Not affiliated with Google or the Chromium project.

What you get - Real browser extensions. Bitwarden, Dark Reader, uBlock Origin: the desktop ones, on your phone. Pin the ones you use to the toolbar. - uBlock Origin, already installed. The full version, not Lite, because Bare keeps Manifest V2 working. Shipped exactly as its author publishes it. Remove it like anything else if you would rather not have it. Its page in Extensions says it is not from the Chrome Web Store, which is true: the store stopped carrying it. - Extensions from a file. The Extensions page has Load unpacked, Load CRX for a packaged .crx you have downloaded, and Update, with no Developer mode switch in the way. Bare cannot check whether an extension is safe, so it says so once, in the dialog that adds one, instead of flagging extensions from outside the Chrome Web Store afterwards. Each extension's card has an Allow in Incognito switch, the same setting as the one on its details page. On a new profile uBlock Origin starts allowed in Incognito; every other extension starts off until you turn it on. Developer mode stays on underneath, so cards show IDs and background pages, and an extension loaded from a folder is never disabled for coming from outside a store. The risk sentence is skipped when a .crx updates an extension that is already installed, and a folder whose manifest key gives an installed extension's ID takes over that extension and its storage. An extension loaded from a folder is read from it again on later starts without asking. The dialog's sentence and button, the new buttons and their messages are in English only. - A short welcome. Five pages for the search engine, the ad blocker, where the address bar sits, downloads, background audio, notifications, the default browser and updates. It comes back after each update, starting from what you already chose, so a new choice is asked about rather than made for you. Bare does not ask for notifications anywhere else: on Android 13 or later, skip that row and downloads show no notifications until you allow them on the welcome after the next update, in Android's settings, or when a site asks and you agree. - No telemetry, no AI, no sign-in prompts. DuckDuckGo is the default from first launch. A few things still reach a server on their own, and each is named in Network behaviour rather than glossed over. - Save what a page is playing. Long press a video or an audio player and Bare offers you the file, including on sites that stream in pieces and normally offer nothing at all. - Video keeps playing in the background. Lock the phone or switch apps and the audio carries on, for sites that support it. - Your download manager, if you want one. Hand downloads to 1DM or similar instead of the browser, or leave it off and keep them in Bare. -The other app does not get your sign-in to the site, so a file that needs it may fail there. - Links open in the browser, not in apps. A Reddit or YouTube result stays where you are. Phone numbers and email links still open the right app. - Video that behaves. H.264 and AAC are included. Fullscreen follows your rotation lock instead of forcing landscape, and clears the camera cutout instead of sitting beside it. - Dark stays dark. No white flash while a page loads on a dark theme. There is also an optional setting to have Bare darken light sites itself. Add your own search engine. Chromium ships the add-engine screen on Android but leaves it switched off. It is on here, under Settings, Search engine, Manage search engines.