How do I disable Brave Lens and return Google image search to context menu

I’m not a fan of the Brave Lens, or the Google Lens for that matter. This is a bad update for anyone who uses reverse image search regularly. Lens doesn’t appear to have basic options like image size, date, etc.

This was a bad update, IMO. If anything there should be an option to use the old way, new way, or both.

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Hi again. :grin: For those of us who don’t use Lens, can you go into more detail? I posted in the other topic about this some questions that maybe would help me understand. Feel like answering them? :joy:

Hopefully, you can get some help from a community member, or moderator, who understands the issue. In the future, you may want to post something like this in the Feedback category. I think it is more active than this one (Uncategorized).

I just noticed this switch Brave did from Google image search to brave lens, today & was pissed. They never asked me - they just did it. The reason I switched to Brave, to begin with, is that they didn’t appear to force crap down your throat like the other big platforms. They don’t reverse this quick or offer me the option to easily switch back - I will be giving Brave browser the boot quick here. I wouldn’t mind if Brave Lens was as good a product as google image search, but it’s not. It sucks.

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@CentralNYGuy Welcome to the community.

I don’t use this feature but it does appear to be a push button issue with those that do. An issue report was created in Brave GitHub, so hopefully there is an easy fix that can be released sooner rather than later. Brave GitHub is what I would call their development site. No idea what it is referenced as officially. lol

The link to the issue was posted in the other topic about this issue (you posted there too). Did you see it? I copied it over just in case you missed it. You can track the progress of the issue there.

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If they actually try to force this on us, or even if there’s some legal issues with Google, I am ditching Brave for good.

First it was the inability to unlink multiple wallets, because of which I am stuck for 3 months with not being able to receive Brave ads, and now this?

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@BorislavM Hi and welcome to the community.

@rodrigoaafn posted this in the topic How to remove Brave Lens?

Did you ever submit a wallet unlinking request form? Just follow the instructions in this post to unlink a slot.

There is a self-serve wallet linking slot management tool planned for release later this month or next: Implement solution for linking limits

Yes, I did, I am being replied with the same responses several times already. Nothing works.

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None of this works. I’m uninstalling it. I started an independent post on this issue at the same time as the post you’re responding to & they immediately took it down. They’re squashing negative dissent on the matter. They’re no different than these other big corporate oligarchs. I’m not playing games just because they want to ram crap down people’s throats.

I have found this really annoying too. I can suggest a good work around. Install the Tineye Chrome extension from here (https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/tineye-reverse-image-sear/haebnnbpedcbhciplfhjjkbafijpncjl?hl=en). In some ways Tineye is better than Google image search as it finds partial matches of images and you can sort the results easily by size, date etc. (which is great for finding the original source of an image) :vulcan_salute:t4: :+1:t4:

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@CentralNYGuy

I don’t think they are “squashing negative dissent” at all. If they were, they would have also removed this post and the other post about this issue. Your post in the other topic was identical (pasted below). If you were basically trying to create a topic with the same wording, that was probably why it was deleted.

I think your post was deleted because you were “spamming” the forum with the same post/issue. You probably even got a notice as you were typing saying that the post you were writing was similar to one you just wrote. It may even have been deleted by a bot and not an actual person.

As for the Brave Lens, it is the same as Google Lens I think. The naming is a branding issue as mentioned in the issue report on GitHub. I agree you should be able to turn it off. The same switch to do that is in Chrome and Brave. It just doesn’t work in Brave for some reason, hence the issue report.

@CaptainChaos Hi and welcome to the community.

Yep, if it were me dealing with the issue I would find it extremely annoying too! Thank-you for recommending another option.

I think a workaround isn’t the best solution and probably isn’t going to make anyone happy. In the end it is going to be a personal choice whether someone decides to continue using Brave (and a workaround) until a fix is released or move to a different Browser with possibly less privacy and security (and BAT! lol) options as Brave.

This topic will close 2 months after the last reply. NO, IT WILL NOT! I LITERALLY JUST CREATED AN ACCOUNT TO SAY, WE DON’T LIKE THIS!!! ROLLBACK!, UNDO! UNDO! UNDO!
We want this brave lens thing OUT, give us back pure Google Searches, Brave was once a sanctuary, now the sanctions begin! WHYYYYY!!! this is painful. do whatever you can do to return to your previous state. take it back, I dont want it!!

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Was curious about this too. In chrome it was just a matter of going to the flags page and disabling the default to Google Lens. Tried the same thing here and disabled Google Lens, but Brave Lens is still active with no way to turn it off. Extremely disappointing as Lens is just an awful and useless tool for image searches. Hopefully this gets rectified quickly.

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@dgls @HazyWave Hi and welcome to the community.

I think this is a Chrome problem and not specifically a Brave Browser problem. There are many reddit posts created in the last few days complaining of the same thing. I posted a few below. Apparently, Chrome has disabled the switch to turn it off. I don’t know if that is an easy fix for Brave or not. There is an issue report opened on Brave GitHub, but I think the problem started with Chrome and not Brave.

How to disable Google Lens? I just want normal Google Image Search

How do I disable Google Lens?

Cannot disable Google Lens?

Google Lens Getting Annoying Help!!! [Do anyone have the same problem?]

I just checked and Chrome still shows the ability to disable it in Flags, and when I right click on an image the menu gives the option for an image search not a Google Lens search. And when I look back at the Brave Flags there’s still the option to disable Google Lens. Disabling Google Lens just changes the option in the menu to Search Using Brave Lens instead. There’s no option for disabling Brave Lens.

Not sure what you or the others are seeing, but it’s definitely a Brave issue for me and not one with Chrome. Still more than happy I switched over considering all the Chrome issues I’ve had lately, and this is one annoying as hell problem for something I do every day. But it’s a small one compare to how much smoother it runs and the better options it has. Hopefully this gets resolved soon though.

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@HazyWave It looks like, from reading the Chrome reddit posts, the flag still works in 98 but not in 99. Since Brave’s update has a Chrome 99 update, I don’t think the flag in Brave is working.

Source: Release Channel 1.36.109 Notes
Upgraded Chromium to 99.0.4844.51. (#21370) (Changelog for 99.0.4844.51)

Brave Lens is Google Lens. The menu option naming/branding issue was commented on in the GitHub issue opened. So, no matter the name, the Lens feature can’t be disabled at this time in the new version! ugh :grin:

If they don’t fix it maybe an earlier portable option will probably work.

Use this one for now: (Temp fix but its very useful) - disable other search engine in option

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