my Brave Browser is terrorising me since some time now, in the top right corner is a red upwards pointing arrow telling me : Brave is out of date, and it tells me, it is unable to update, and requires me to reinstall.
Since I expect this to have following negative side effects :
losing my bookmarks
losing my tabs
losing my addons
losing my Brave Settings
I did not press the reinstall button yet.
So my question is now : how can I update Brave without losing any of the mentioned ?
Does clicking on the blue button “reinstall Brave” lead to losing all or any of the mentioned ?
I was so glad to have found a quite good Browser but now I am disappointed and feel insecure.
@Blobster2000Plus,
Can you actually show me what the reinstall button looks like? I’m not sure I’ve ever seen it before.
There’s a couple things you can do:
Note: Please backup your bookmarks (Settings --> Bookmarks --> Export Bookmarks), passwords (Settings --> Autofill --> Passwords --> Export), and Rewards wallet/data directly as an extra layer of safety.
You can copy your profile data directly by going to ~\Users\[YourUserName]\AppData\Local\BraveSoftware\Brave-Browser\User Data\Default, copying this directory, then reinstalling and paste/replacing the newly installed folder with your saved copy.
You can try downloading and run the installer again from our website. This will only attempt to fetch and apply the update files, not overwrite them.
those are 2 screenshots in the order they appear as how Brave looks for me when I get to the reinstall button. I painted black the parts that contain personal information/settings.
Will 1. or 2. require me to rebuild all settings and install addons + configure them all again from zero ?
Because if so, then I will just keep Brave as it is until it is broken and then use a browser, that is able to update itself without forcing me to rebuild it for quite some time, as it does have A LOT settings, which I figured out to set up correctly during the last months while I used the browser.
For me it means I would have to screenshot every page where there are settings, and all settings of all my addons, and then compare the freshly installed browser with my ton of screenshots and fix every setting. Another reason to NOT do this is, next month it might happen again, that is why I will not do this.
I am not sure which data will exactly of those I listed be contained in 1.
Could you please clarify ?
I don’t need passwords or anything except for the listed points.
@kadir,
I just discussed with some team members and it seems that you’re actually way too far behind in updates to just update. Instead, you’ll have to un/reinstall. Try the following:
My above directory was incorrect, please copy the entire Brave-browser directory in the AppData folder and save it somewhere safe. This contains your profile data.
Go to Add/Remove programs and uninstall the browser. When asked, elect not to remove associated profile data – you just made a safe copy of it in step 1, but no need to erase it at all if we don’t have to.
Once uninstalled, visit our website and download/run the installer.
@Blobster2000Plus,
I think you may have to install extensions again, but other than maybe that you should be good. And yes, that is the correct folder.
Thank you very much, it went without any problem.
After reinstall, Brave is running with exactly the same Addons, and it seems everything is the same as before.
