Cookie AutoDelete alternative

TL;DR: CookieVault Guardian is the open-source, Manifest V3-native Cookie AutoDelete alternative. It restores the tab-close auto-cleanup workflow on every Chromium browser plus Firefox, matches the whitelist / greylist UX, and extends cleanup to localStorage, IndexedDB, and Cache Storage — areas Cookie AutoDelete never covered.

CookieVault Guardian is a free, MIT-licensed browser extension that provides a Manifest V3 replacement for Cookie AutoDelete, the long-running privacy extension that Chrome force-disabled in late 2024 as the Manifest V2 sunset reached its final phase. Guardian rebuilds the per-tab cleanup workflow on modern extension APIs and expands the cleanup target list from cookies-only to every browser-storage API that can hold tracking state.

What happened to Cookie AutoDelete

In short: Cookie AutoDelete was the privacy community’s default tab-close cookie cleaner on Chrome and Firefox for years, with a reported peak install base of around 280,000 Chrome weekly active users¹. Chrome’s Manifest V2 sunset disabled all MV2 extensions in the stable channel between June 2024 and early 2025²; Cookie AutoDelete was caught in this wave because its core architecture depended on persistent MV2 background pages and was never rewritten for MV3. The GitHub repository³ remains public under the MIT license; the Firefox Add-ons listing still works because Firefox kept MV2 support.

Cookie AutoDelete was created by Kenny Do (mrdokenny on GitHub) and grew into a community-maintained project under the Cookie-AutoDelete GitHub organization³. It served users who wanted Firefox’s “Delete cookies and site data when Firefox is closed” behavior, but on a per-tab rather than per-browser-session basis — closing the last tab on a domain triggered cleanup for that domain, independent of whether the browser kept running.

The extension’s core mechanism — listening to chrome.tabs.onRemoved from a persistent background page and reconciling the open-tab set against the cookie store — depended on APIs that Manifest V3 changed fundamentally. MV3 replaces persistent background pages with ephemeral service workers and requires extensions to use declarative APIs in many places where MV2 allowed imperative ones. Rewriting Cookie AutoDelete for MV3 would have required substantial reengineering of the tab-lifecycle tracking logic, and the maintainers publicly indicated⁴ that this rewrite was not on their roadmap.

When Chrome stable’s MV2 disablement reached general rollout in late 2024, Cookie AutoDelete stopped functioning for an estimated 280,000+ weekly active Chrome users overnight, along with thousands of other unmigrated MV2 extensions.

Why you need a replacement now

In short: If you used Cookie AutoDelete on Chrome / Edge / Brave / Opera / Vivaldi / Arc, you have no in-store update path — the extension is permanently disabled. If you used it on Firefox, you can keep using it, but you lose the ability to share a whitelist across browsers. Either way, the storage scope (cookies + partial localStorage) is narrower than modern tracking practices warrant.

Three reasons a 2025 Cookie AutoDelete user should evaluate a migration:

1. Chrome browsers no longer load it. This is hard, not soft — Chrome’s MV2 disablement in the stable channel is policy, not a bug, and the disablement is not reversible. Users on Chrome / Edge (Chromium) / Brave / Opera / Vivaldi / Arc are left without auto-cleanup unless they install something else.
2. Storage scope has moved beyond cookies. Tracking and session state today routinely live in localStorage, IndexedDB, and Cache Storage — none of which Cookie AutoDelete cleans comprehensively. Cleaning only cookies on tab close is increasingly a partial defense, because a tracker can rehydrate user identity from any of those side channels.
3. The maintainer track is wound down. Even on Firefox, the original maintainers have indicated⁴ that active development on Cookie AutoDelete has slowed. The repository is still there, still MIT-licensed, but updates are infrequent.

If you only use Firefox and your current whitelist works for you, there is no urgency — Cookie AutoDelete on Firefox is not going away tomorrow. But for everyone else, and for users who want unified cleanup across all storage types, a Manifest V3-native replacement is the better posture.

What CookieVault Guardian adds beyond Cookie AutoDelete

In short: Guardian is a strict superset of Cookie AutoDelete’s feature surface. Everything Cookie AutoDelete did, Guardian does; the additions are expanded storage cleanup (localStorage, sessionStorage, IndexedDB, Cache Storage, Service Worker registrations), cross-device whitelist sync (Pro), and modern Manifest V3 compatibility.

Guardian’s design starts from “Cookie AutoDelete’s UX, but on MV3” and adds three categories of improvements:

• Storage scope. Cookie AutoDelete cleaned cookies and, in later versions, partial localStorage. Guardian cleans cookies, localStorage, sessionStorage, IndexedDB, Cache Storage, and Service Worker registrations — every browser-storage surface that can hold cross-session state. Each storage type is individually toggleable in settings.
• Cross-device whitelist sync (Pro). Cookie AutoDelete’s whitelist lives locally per browser profile. Guardian’s Pro tier syncs the whitelist across all your devices via an end-to-end encrypted channel — the same domain rules apply on your laptop, work machine, and home desktop without manual re-entry.
• Manifest V3 native. No persistent background pages. Service-worker-based architecture. Compatible with the next decade of Chrome extension API evolution rather than the previous one.

Everything else — whitelist UX, greylist (delete on next close then auto-promote), wildcard matching, Firefox container support, manual “Clean now” button — is preserved at parity.

What Guardian does NOT do that Cookie AutoDelete did

Honesty matters: Guardian is not strictly better in every dimension. Three areas where Cookie AutoDelete had a small edge:

• Smaller install footprint. Cookie AutoDelete packs to ~150 KB; Guardian packs to ~480 KB (sync client + crypto library inflates the bundle).
• Longer Firefox track record. Cookie AutoDelete has been on Firefox Add-ons since 2017 with a multi-year stability record. Guardian is newer there.
• Pure local-only mode: Cookie AutoDelete never asked you to create an account. Guardian’s local-only mode is identical, but the existence of a Pro / sync tier may feel like overhead even when you do not use it.

If those points outweigh the storage-scope and sync benefits for your workflow, staying on Cookie AutoDelete (Firefox) is reasonable.

CookieVault Guardian vs Cookie AutoDelete vs alternatives

The honest read: for Firefox-only users with a stable workflow, Cookie AutoDelete remains a reasonable choice. For everyone else — Chromium-browser users, cross-browser users, or anyone who wants cleanup beyond cookies — Guardian is the upgrade.

How to migrate from Cookie AutoDelete to Guardian

The migration takes about 90 seconds in the happy path. Full ordered checklist:

1. Export your Cookie AutoDelete whitelist. While Cookie AutoDelete is still installed (on Firefox, or on a Chromium browser that has not yet force-disabled it), open its Settings page and choose “Export → Whitelist + Greylist”. Save the JSON.
2. Install CookieVault Guardian. Chrome Web Store / Edge Add-ons / Firefox Add-ons search for “CookieVault Guardian”. For Opera / Vivaldi / Arc / Brave, side-load the signed CRX from the GitHub release page.
3. Import the whitelist. Click the Guardian toolbar icon → Settings (gear) → “Import → Cookie AutoDelete JSON”. Select the file from step 1.
4. Verify domains appear in the whitelist. Switch to the Whitelist tab. Confirm every domain transferred. Subdomain inheritance is on by default — a single example.com entry covers mail.example.com.
5. Test the cleanup workflow on a real site. Open a non-whitelisted site, browse for a minute, close the tab, reopen — you should be logged out, localStorage cleared, IndexedDB cleared. If a site you expected to stay logged in does not, add it to the whitelist.
6. Tune the cleanup scope. Settings → Cleanup Targets — enable / disable each storage type independently. Defaults are sensible; narrow only if a critical site breaks.
7. Enable encrypted whitelist sync (optional). Settings → Sync → create an account → choose a passphrase. The passphrase derives the encryption key client-side; the sync server stores only opaque ciphertext.
8. Uninstall Cookie AutoDelete. On any browser where it is still installed (typically Firefox), go to the extensions page and remove it. Keep the exported JSON for at least 30 days as a rollback option.

If the import fails at step 3 with “unsupported format,” your JSON may be from a pre-3.x Cookie AutoDelete version. Open an issue on the CookieVault GitHub repository with the file attached (scrub domain names that are sensitive) and we will add a compatibility shim.

Frequently asked questions

Q: Why did Cookie AutoDelete stop working in Chrome? Chrome disabled all Manifest V2 extensions in stable between June 2024 and early 2025. Cookie AutoDelete relied on a persistent MV2 background page that does not exist in MV3, and was not rewritten in time.

Q: Does Cookie AutoDelete still work in Firefox? Yes. Firefox kept MV2 support. If you only use Firefox and your current setup works, there is no urgency to migrate.

Q: Will Guardian import my Cookie AutoDelete JSON? Yes — full whitelist + greylist + wildcard + per-container associations. Open an issue if you hit a parse error.

Q: What does Guardian clean beyond cookies? localStorage, sessionStorage, IndexedDB, Cache Storage, Service Worker registrations. Each toggleable.

Q: What sites break under Guardian’s expanded cleanup? Anything that stores state client-side without server backup — drafts in online editors, PWA offline caches, JS framework state caches. Whitelist them.

Q: Is the free tier limited? No functional limits. Pro adds cross-device sync and team rule sharing.

Q: Is Guardian the same extension as CookieVault Editor? No — two separate extensions. Install one, the other, or both.

Q: Can I undo Guardian’s cleanup? No — cookie and storage cleanup is irreversible once it runs. Whitelist sensitive sites; Pro’s 30-day cookie history covers cookies (not other storage types) for accidental closures.