Back in 2022 [1]Google deprecated and then removed JPEG-XL image support from the Chrome/Chromium browser codebase and now in 2026 it's back. Last month I wrote about [2]JPEG-XL decoding merged back to Chromium/Chrome and that has rolled out today as part of today's Chrome 145 stable debut.

Google today [3]announced Chrome 145 being pushed out to the stable channel across Windows, macOS, and Linux systems. Most exciting is JPEG-XL decoding support returning to the Blink engine. Google is using the Rust-based jxl-rs decoder rather than the C++ libjxl library for better memory safety. For the Chrome 145 release the feature is gated by the enable-jxl-image-format flag.

[4]

Chrome 145 also adds support for the text-justify CSS property, column wrapping support in multicol, device bound session credentials, an SQLite backend for IndexedDB, reduced user-agent strings by default, Upsert, and other enhancements.

More details on the Chrome 145 features for those interested via the [5]ChromeStatus.com blog .



[1] https://www.phoronix.com/news/Chrome-Drops-JPEG-XL

[2] https://www.phoronix.com/news/JPEG-XL-Returns-Chrome-Chromium

[3] https://chromereleases.googleblog.com/2026/02/stable-channel-update-for-desktop_10.html

[4] https://www.phoronix.com/image-viewer.php?id=2026&image=chrome_145_lrg

[5] https://chromestatus.com/roadmap