Category: Chrome OS Stable Channel

A third Chrome 67 update has come to the Chrome OS Stable Channel today, bringing further security fixes to the platform as well as a clarification on a security patch.  The update is build 67.0.3396.99 or 67.0.3396.101 (Platform version: 10575.58.0) depending on your device.  It comes two weeks after the second update was released back on June 13.

If your Chromebook is in the Stable Channel, you can check for the update by typing chrome://help in the browser bar and then clicking the Check for update button next to your current build information.  The release of this update happened last yesterday so it could still take a while for everyone to see the update as being available.

A second Chrome 67 based build for the Chrome OS Stable Channel has been released for most devices today.  The new build is 67.0.3396.87 (Platform version: 10575.55.0) and follows up the initial release of Chrome 67 last week.

As a general rule, the Chromium team releases a build then follows it quickly with a second build that goes out to the majority of devices, especially those capable of running Android apps.  This appears to be the case once again.

A surprising and almost unheard of fourth stable channel release for Chrome OS has landed.  The release to build 66.0.3359.203 (Platform version: 10452.99.0), based on Chrome 66, comes just days before the anticipated update to Chrome 67 in the Chrome OS Stable Channel.  It comes two weeks after a rare 3rd build in the channel.

The reasoning behind the fourth update is not known and the notoriously cryptic release notes from the Chromium team within Google aren’t much help in solving the mystery.  They merely state the generic, “This build contains a number of bug fixes and security updates“.  There isn’t even a link to the Git for the release.

A third update to Chrome 66 has arrived in the Chrome OS Stable Channel today for the majority of devices out there.  Build 66.0.3359.181 (Platform version: 10452.96.0) arrives about 10 days after the second build of Chrome 66 was made available to Chrome OS.  It is not too often that a 3rd build is made available in the Stable Channel unless a show stopping bug or security flaw was found.  In this case, the Chromium team hasn’t released any details on what was addressed.

The update appears to be rolling out widely.  My Google Pixelbook was updated to the build late last night.

Just two days after the final beta build of Chrome 66 was released to the Chrome OS Beta Channel, that final build has now made its way to the Chrome OS Stable Channel as the official build.  The build is the same as the final beta, 66.0.3359.137 (Platform version: 10452.74.0) and it is available for most machines.  As is often the case with the first build in the Stable Channel, this build is not available for devices that are running Android apps.  There will be a second build, likely next week, which will be available for those Chromebooks.

My Pixelbook remains at Chrome 65 this morning as an example.

While there are a few new features in this new build, the focus is on improvements of existing features.  There is also a focus on security, as you would expect, with patches for the Meltdown and Spectre vulnerabilities in this build too.

The Chromium team has released a rare third update to Chrome 65 in the Chrome OS Stable Channel today.  The new build is 65.0.3325.209 (Platform version: 10323.67/68) and will be arriving on all systems over the course of the next few days.  It is not uncommon for there to be two Stable Channel releases with each major build of Chrome OS.  Usually the first one is for non-Android app running Chromebooks while the second, about a week later, brings the new build to Android running Chromebooks.

A third update however doesn’t happen often (it hasn’t happened since Chrome 62) and usually is reflective of the team finding a significant security flaw or bug that is impacting a high number of users.