Google has delayed disabling third-party cookies in Chrome this year due to multiple challenges and increased scrutiny from the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA).
Why we care Brands now have more time to prepare and explore alternatives to third-party cookies. However, this is just another delay. Third-party cookies will eventually go away, but not this year.
What Google is saying: Google acknowledged concerns about comments and requests it has received from industry, regulators, developers and the CMA in a statement it released via Privacy Sandbox News:
“We recognize that there are ongoing challenges related to reconciling divergent feedback from industry, regulators and developers, and we will continue to engage closely with the entire ecosystem.” “It is also critical that the CMA has sufficient time to review all the evidence, including industry test results, that the CMA has asked market participants to provide by the end of June.” “Given these significant considerations, we will not complete the opt-out of third-party cookies during the second half of the fourth quarter.”
New deadline: Despite the delay, Google did not provide a specific timetable. Google expressed hope for completion by 2025. As a reminder, Google first announced its plans to phase out cookies in January 2020.
Obstacles: Since the first announcement of the change to remove cookies at the end of 2024, there have been three main obstacles that have made this deadline unlikely:
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About the author
Anu Adegbola has been a paid media editor for Search Engine Land since 2024. She covers paid search, paid social, retail media, video and more.
In 2008, Anu’s career began with
deliver digital marketing campaigns (mainly but not exclusively Paid Search) by creating strategies, maximizing ROI, automating repetitive processes and making all marketing departments efficient through inspiring leadership both on the agency, client and marketing technology side.
Outside of Search Engine Land article editing, she is the founder of the PPC networking event: PPC Live, host of weekly podcast PPCChat Roundup, ibRand Evangelist at ClickTech.
He is also an international speaker with some of the stages he has presented being SMX (USA), SMX (Munich), Friends of Search (Amsterdam), brightonSEO, The Marketing Meetup, HeroConf (PPC Hero), SearchLove, BiddableWorld, SESLondon, PPC Live Chat, AdWorld Experience (Bologna) and more.
