Also happens on the Brave Origin release

Brave was supposed to fix this people stable release :
https://www.reddit.com/r/brave_browser/comments/1ugbwd9/comment/otyxg4o

Temporary workaround for violentmonkey users:

• Enable brave developer mode
• Download the extension's latest release from their github page at https://github.com/violentmonkey/violentmonkey/releases/tag/v2.41.0
• Extract this to a folder like the picture below

Then very, VERY carefully do these in sequence:

• Do not uninstall violentmonkey, that will delete your user data
• Go to brave://extensions/
• Turn on developer mode
• Click on "Load Unpacked"
• Select the extension folder you extracted earlier
• Now turn the extension OFF in the view by clicking the on/off button
• Note the "extension id" for the UNPACKED one you loaded, it will look something like the picture below
• CLOSE BRAVE NOW and do not open it back up yet

Now go over to your extension storage settings folder, under windows this is at:

%localappdata%\BraveSoftware\Brave-Browser\User Data\Default\Local Extension Settings

In this folder, there's going to be many garbled name extension names, violentmonkey (the original one with your scripts) is this folder:

jinjaccalgkegednnccohejagnlnfdag

You will need to copy everything inside this folder to the unpacked extension folder you noted down from earlier, so just copy over all these files from the extension that has your data to the new folder of the extension you just loaded.

Now your data is in the new temporary violentmonkey extension, you can boot brave browser up then:

• Go to brave://extensions/
• Turn ON the unpacked extension (it should allow you to)
• Now go to Violentmonkey -> Open dashboard/settings -> Settings | Update | Sync -> Backup -> Export (with all boxes ticked)
• You now have a backup with all your userscripts and settings

You can then turn off the unpacked extension, remove it and disable developer mode. If you leave the extension enabled, the next time you turn on brave it will automatically disable the unpacked extension and will not allow you to turn it back on (which is why we turn it off as soon as we load it in).

This is a temporary workaround to recover user data, I expect Brave will provide a developer flag or similar to just allow enabling the extensions temporarily so users can recover their data, given they can still load just fine under this version and there was no notice that these extensions were going to be turned off by an automatic update.

Edit: For a MV3-compatible replacement for violentmonkey, ScriptCat seems to support (under it's backup restore feature) the violentmonkey backup zip file and correctly restores all user data alongside the scripts.

Same issue on macOS / Apple Silicon — so this is not Windows-specific.

• Brave: 1.92.134 (Official Build) (arm64)
• Chromium: 150.0.7871.63
• OS: macOS 26.5 (Tahoe), Apple M5
• Channel: release (stable)

After an automatic update + restart, all Manifest V2 extensions (here:
Violentmonkey 2.41.0) were force-disabled with "This extension was turned off
because it is no longer supported", and there is no way to re-enable them from
brave://extensions — which also makes the extension's own export/backup UI
unreachable.

One clarification that may reassure others worried about data loss: the settings
are not actually gone. The stored data is still intact on disk and can be
recovered offline:

• .../Brave-Browser/Default/Local Extension Settings/<extension-id>/ (LevelDB)
• .../Brave-Browser/Default/IndexedDB/chrome-extension_<extension-id>_0.indexeddb.leveldb/

For Violentmonkey specifically, each userscript is stored under a code:<id> key
in that LevelDB, so the scripts can be extracted straight back into .user.js
files without the browser. The issue is purely that the UI blocks re-enabling —
the data itself is not deleted.

Request: please provide a way to temporarily re-enable a force-disabled MV2
extension (or an "export data" action on the disabled entry) so users can
retrieve their settings/userscripts before migrating to an MV3 manager.

I found a really simple but janky way to enable MV2 extensions again:

1. Install Extensity
2. Enable the extension via the Extensity menu and press Enter quickly as a popup window briefly appears

I found a really simple but janky way to enable MV2 extensions again:

1. Install Extensity
2. Enable the extension via the Extensity menu and press Enter quickly as a popup window briefly appears

Interesting, I actually read about this exact thing on reddit and tried that before, but I never saw a popup window at all, clicking the extension just keeps it turned off and nothing happens. Glad that this works for some people since it's easier than my workaround above, but if it doesn't at least for now we can go with the developer mode workaround to recover data!

@Fabricio20 That is a bummer. I have set the ExtensionManifestV2Availability DWORD in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Policies\BraveSoftware\Brave to 2, maybe that could help?

I was actually able to re-enable violentmonkey just by going to the extension details page, inspect element on the toggle, and remove the disabled attribute from the <cr-toggle> element. Then you can click it, Brave will give you a warning that the extension is no longer supported, but you can accept the warning and re-enable the extension. It has been working fine ever since doing that.

I do also have developer mode turned on in my extension settings, not sure if that makes a difference.

Commenting to say this is happening with Ad Nauseam as well, linking issue from their repo below for additional info

dhowe/AdNauseam#2814

Duplicate of #56866 I believe.

I was actually able to re-enable violentmonkey just by going to the extension details page, inspect element on the toggle, and remove the disabled attribute from the <cr-toggle> element. Then you can click it, Brave will give you a warning that the extension is no longer supported, but you can accept the warning and re-enable the extension. It has been working fine ever since doing that.

I do also have developer mode turned on in my extension settings, not sure if that makes a difference.

It worked! This is amazing

Completely unacceptable result from Brave, worst experience after years of use.

@Fabricio20 surely you can get the ID just from clicking "find alternatives" on the extension and checking the URL, and skip this local download business - IF you only need file access and not the extension running.

I was actually able to re-enable violentmonkey just by going to the extension details page, inspect element on the toggle, and remove the disabled attribute from the <cr-toggle> element. Then you can click it, Brave will give you a warning that the extension is no longer supported, but you can accept the warning and re-enable the extension. It has been working fine ever since doing that.

I do also have developer mode turned on in my extension settings, not sure if that makes a difference.

it worked with ublock and feedbro

Completely unacceptable result from Brave, worst experience after years of use.

@Fabricio20 surely you can get the ID just from clicking "find alternatives" on the extension and checking the URL, and skip this local download business - IF you only need file access and not the extension running.

Specifically need the extension running, so you can go into the settings page and use the export feature to grab all the settings, scripts and user data. The workaround shared by other users via inspect element is a nice, faster way to get there as well for those that need to export data from the extension, which is the main complain about this rollout (they disabled all extensions without giving you a warning that "hey, next update these will stop working, back up your data if you have any").

I found a really simple but janky way to enable MV2 extensions again:

1. Install Extensity
2. Enable the extension via the Extensity menu and press Enter quickly as a popup window briefly appears

https://x.com/BlindWanda/status/2073789779922014579 also works but just a PITA to do for multiple extensions

Insane rugpull from Brave

Has anyone figured out how to stop unsupported MV2 extensions disappearing after restarting the browser? Thanks.