How can I share my Google Chrome search engine entries?

Question

I have created some search entries in Google Chrome using 'Edit search engines'.

How can I share some of these entries with my colleagues?

Answer 1

Edit 2020-07-27:

The export part of this solution does not work anymore in Chrome 84 (the settings object used in the script is no longer available). The import script is not very useful without the export part but it should still work for importing an existing JSON file with the settings or for transfering search engine settings from an older version of Chrome/Chromium to the current version.

Here is a simple solution to export and import Chrome search engine settings without using any external tools or editing the registry:

1. Open the Search Engine Settings page in Chrome (chrome://settings/searchEngines).
2. Open Chrome Developer Tools.

• Shortcut: F12 or Ctrl+Shift+I (on Windows, shortcuts on other platforms may differ).
• Manual navigation: Three-dot menu in upper-right corner > More Tools > Developer Tools.

3. Click Console in the top menu bar of Chrome Developer Tools.
4. Paste one of the following scripts into the console and press Enter.

To download a JSON file with search engine settings:

(function exportSEs() {
  /* Auxiliary function to download a file with the exported data */
  function downloadData(filename, data) {
    const file = new File([data], { type: 'text/json' });
    const elem = document.createElement('a');
    elem.href = URL.createObjectURL(file);
    elem.download = filename;
    elem.click();
  }

  /* Actual search engine export magic */
  settings.SearchEnginesBrowserProxyImpl.prototype.getSearchEnginesList()
    .then((searchEngines) => {
      downloadData('search_engines.json', JSON.stringify(searchEngines.others));
    });
}());

To import settings from a JSON file created using the script above:

(async function importSEs() {
  /* Auxiliary function to open a file selection dialog */
  function selectFileToRead() {
    return new Promise((resolve) => {
      const input = document.createElement('input');
      input.setAttribute('type', 'file');
      input.addEventListener('change', (e) => {
        resolve(e.target.files[0]);
      }, false);
      input.click();
    });
  }

  /* Auxiliary function to read data from a file */
  function readFile(file) {
    return new Promise((resolve) => {
      const reader = new FileReader();
      reader.addEventListener('load', (e) => {
        resolve(e.target.result);
      });
      reader.readAsText(file);
    });
  }

  const file = await selectFileToRead();
  const content = await readFile(file);
  const searchEngines = JSON.parse(content);
  searchEngines.forEach(({ name, keyword, url }) => {
    /* Actual search engine import magic */
    chrome.send('searchEngineEditStarted', [-1]);
    chrome.send('searchEngineEditCompleted', [name, keyword, url]);
  });
}());

Notes

• I tested the scripts in Chrome 75.0.3770.100 on Windows 8.1.
• The scripts export and import search enines in the Other Search Engines section only but they can easily be tweaked to include default search engines as well.
• Do not try to distribute the scripts as bookmarklets, bookmarklets do not execute on chrome:// URLs (been there, done that).

Answer 2

Here's a single command to export your chrome search engines as CSV on linux:

sqlite3 -csv ~/.config/chromium/Default/Web\ Data 'select short_name,keyword,url from keywords' > ~/search-engines.csv

You need sqlite3 installed. Replace ~/.config/chrome with the corresponding Windows path if you're on Windows. Should be something like %AppData%\Local\Google\Chrome\User Data

Exporting as SQL for re-importing elsewhere

Instead of exporting to CSV, you could export to sqlite insert statements:

(printf 'begin transaction;\n'; sqlite3 ~/.config/chromium/Default/Web\ Data 'select short_name,keyword,url,favicon_url from keywords' | awk -F\| '{ printf "insert into keywords (short_name, keyword, url, favicon_url) values ('"'"%s"'"', '"'"%s"'"', '"'"%s"'"', '"'"%s"'"');\n", $1, $2, $3, $4 }'; printf 'end transaction;\n') > ~/search-engine-export.sql

Then copy ~/search-engine-export.sql to the other machine, and import with this command:

sqlite3 ~/.config/chromium/Default/Web\ Data < search-engine-export.sql

Making sure to replace the Web Data path with the one on your machine as described above.

Answer 3

...piggybacking off of https://superuser.com/a/1458616/55621 but trying to update it to work with current versions of Chrome. This worked circa Chrome 88 on a Mac.

To download a JSON file with search engine settings:

(function exportSEs() {
  /* Auxiliary function to download a file with the exported data */
  function downloadData(filename, data) {
    const file = new File([data], { type: 'text/json' });
    const elem = document.createElement('a');
    elem.href = URL.createObjectURL(file);
    elem.download = filename;
    elem.click();
  }

  let searchEngines = [];
  document.querySelector('settings-ui').shadowRoot
    .querySelector('settings-main').shadowRoot
    .querySelector('settings-basic-page').shadowRoot
    .querySelector('settings-search-page').shadowRoot
    .querySelector('settings-search-engines-page').shadowRoot
    .querySelector('settings-search-engines-list#otherEngines').shadowRoot
    .querySelectorAll('settings-search-engine-entry')
    .forEach($el => searchEngines.push(
      {
        name: $el.shadowRoot.querySelector('#name-column').textContent,
        keyword: $el.shadowRoot.querySelector('#keyword-column').textContent,
        url: $el.shadowRoot.querySelector('#url-column').textContent
      })
    )

  downloadData('search_engines.json', JSON.stringify(searchEngines));
}());

To import settings from a JSON file created using the script above:

(async function importSEs() {
  /* Auxiliary function to open a file selection dialog */
  function selectFileToRead() {
    return new Promise((resolve) => {
      const input = document.createElement('input');
      input.setAttribute('type', 'file');
      input.addEventListener('change', (e) => {
        resolve(e.target.files[0]);
      }, false);
      input.click();
    });
  }

  /* Auxiliary function to read data from a file */
  function readFile(file) {
    return new Promise((resolve) => {
      const reader = new FileReader();
      reader.addEventListener('load', (e) => {
        resolve(e.target.result);
      });
      reader.readAsText(file);
    });
  }

  const file = await selectFileToRead();
  const content = await readFile(file);
  const searchEngines = JSON.parse(content);
  searchEngines.forEach(({ name, keyword, url }) => {
    /* Actual search engine import magic */
    chrome.send('searchEngineEditStarted', [-1]);
    chrome.send('searchEngineEditCompleted', [name, keyword, url]);
  });
}());

This is highly likely to break with succeeding versions of Chrome, and there's probably a better way to traverse the dom.

Answer 4

Use Google Takeout https://takeout.google.com to export your Chrome Search Engines to a json file.

Select Chrome, and either select All Chrome data included, or SearchEngines.

The export will contain a SearchEngines.json file.

Answer 5

It's possible, but it's enough of a pain that you won't want to.

1. Find the Web Data file in your Chrome profile. In Windows 7 it will be here: "%USERPROFILE%\AppData\Local\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default\Web Data"

2. Open the file with an SQLite program like SQLite Studio or sqlite in Ubuntu (sudo apt-get install sqlite) and export the keywords table in SQLite Studio or run this command in Linux: sqlite3 "Web Data" ".dump keywords" > keywords.sql

3. Have your colleagues import the keywords, doing the reverse of this process.

Like I said, possible, but painful.

I wrote a Javascript parser to convert the SQL from Web Data into the nearly universal Netscape Bookmark File Format in HTML (ironic that the definitive standard for that format seems to be Microsoft) if you're interested in getting the keywords into other browsers like Firefox or Opera.

If you're interested in an alternative solution, I created Shortmarks to allow you to use the same set of custom search engines in any browser, and I plan to implement the ability to share with others soon. The upcoming release in a few days will have the import code I mentioned above as soon as I'm finished testing the new features.

Answer 6

Based on https://superuser.com/a/1626575/44976

This covers exporting only (since for my use-case I was looking to export search engines from Chrome to Firefox)

For Chrome 112.0.5615.49 the following snippets worked on macOS. Execute in DevTools console after navigating to chrome://settings/searchEngines

Export Search Engines

(function exportSEs() {
  /* Auxiliary function to download a file with the exported data */
  function downloadData(filename, data) {
    const file = new File([data], { type: 'text/json' });
    const elem = document.createElement('a');
    elem.href = URL.createObjectURL(file);
    elem.download = filename;
    elem.click();
  }

  let searchEngines = [];
  document.querySelector('settings-ui').shadowRoot
    .querySelector('settings-main').shadowRoot
    .querySelector('settings-basic-page').shadowRoot
    .querySelector('settings-search-page').shadowRoot
    .querySelector('settings-search-engines-page').shadowRoot
    .querySelector('settings-search-engines-list').shadowRoot
    .querySelectorAll('settings-search-engine-entry')
    .forEach($el => searchEngines.push(
      {
        name: $el.shadowRoot.querySelector('#name-column').textContent,
        keyword: $el.shadowRoot.querySelector('#shortcut-column').textContent,
        url: $el.shadowRoot.querySelector('#url-column-padded').textContent
      })
    )

  downloadData('search_engines.json', JSON.stringify(searchEngines));
}());

Export Site Search

The only difference between the following snippet and the one above is the target for iterating has #activeEngines (which results in Site Search being exported and not Search Engines)

(function exportSEs() {
  /* Auxiliary function to download a file with the exported data */
  function downloadData(filename, data) {
    const file = new File([data], { type: 'text/json' });
    const elem = document.createElement('a');
    elem.href = URL.createObjectURL(file);
    elem.download = filename;
    elem.click();
  }

  let searchEngines = [];
  document.querySelector('settings-ui').shadowRoot
    .querySelector('settings-main').shadowRoot
    .querySelector('settings-basic-page').shadowRoot
    .querySelector('settings-search-page').shadowRoot
    .querySelector('settings-search-engines-page').shadowRoot
    .querySelector('settings-search-engines-list#activeEngines').shadowRoot
    .querySelectorAll('settings-search-engine-entry')
    .forEach($el => searchEngines.push(
      {
        name: $el.shadowRoot.querySelector('#name-column').textContent,
        keyword: $el.shadowRoot.querySelector('#shortcut-column').textContent,
        url: $el.shadowRoot.querySelector('#url-column-padded').textContent
      })
    )

  downloadData('search_engines.json', JSON.stringify(searchEngines));
}());

Answer 7

An update for June 7th, 2022 on Chrome 103.0:

Export

Use the method in this answer to get SearchEngines.json.

Import

I had to modify this answer's import code to the following:

(async function importSEs() {
    /* Auxiliary function to open a file selection dialog */
    function selectFileToRead() {
        return new Promise((resolve) => {
            const input = document.createElement('input');
            input.setAttribute('type', 'file');
            input.addEventListener('change', (e) => {
                resolve(e.target.files[0]);
            }, false);
            input.click();
        });
    }
    /* Auxiliary function to read data from a file */
    function readFile(file) {
        return new Promise((resolve) => {
            const reader = new FileReader();
            reader.addEventListener('load', (e) => {
                resolve(e.target.result);
            });
            reader.readAsText(file);
        });
    }
    const file = await selectFileToRead();
    const content = await readFile(file);
    const searchEngines = JSON.parse(content);
    searchEngines["Search Engines"].forEach(({ short_name, keyword, url }) => {
        /* Actual search engine import magic */
        chrome.send('searchEngineEditStarted', [-1]);
        chrome.send('searchEngineEditCompleted', [short_name, keyword, url]);
    });
}());

Run this in the Chrome console on chrome://settings/searchEngines.

Answer 8

I did following to share my Google Chrome search engine entries and it worked perfectly fine for me:

1. WINDOWS XP: Go to C:\Documents and Settings\MyUserName\Local Settings\Application Data\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default

   ON WINDOWS 7: Go to C:\Users\MyUserName\AppData\Local\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default

2. Copy these 3 files: Preferences, Web Data and Web Data-journal

3. Put those 3 files onto the target machine

Answer 9

For me, I'm on Windows 10 and I wanted to copy search engines from my personal chrome profile to my corporate chrome profile. I did the following:

1. I downloaded SQLite from https://www.sqlite.org/download.html (under "Precompiled Binaries" with the description "A bundle of command-line tools for managing SQLite database files"). I unziped it to c:\utils that's already in my path

2. I opened up cmd.exe

3. I changed directory to my default (personal) chrome profile

   cd "%USERPROFILE%\AppData\Local\Google\Chrome\User Data\Default"
   

4. I exited Chrome entirely (even in the tray). Also, keep a copy of these instructions (or open them in a different browser) because you'll loose them.

5. I ran the following:

   sqlite3 "Web Data" ".dump keywords" > c:\keywords.sql
   

6. I changed to the new profile:

   cd "..\Profile 2\"
   

7. I ran this:

   sqlite3.exe "Web Data" < c:\keywords.sql
   

   I got the following errors, which are okay:

   Error: near line 4: UNIQUE constraint failed: keywords.id
   Error: near line 5: UNIQUE constraint failed: keywords.id
   Error: near line 6: UNIQUE constraint failed: keywords.id
   Error: near line 7: UNIQUE constraint failed: keywords.id
   Error: near line 8: UNIQUE constraint failed: keywords.id
   

   If you get more errors, that means that you added search engines to your new profile. Delete them all, including these new ones just added and re-run this step. Or edit the SQL file by hand.

8. I fired Chrome back up and now my search keywords work fine.

Answer 10

Piggybacking on a piggyback (https://superuser.com/a/1626575/915054) -- this works on Chrome 101. I just added an extra array to it.

//modified from https://superuser.com/a/1626575
(function exportSEs() {
    /* Auxiliary function to download a file with the exported data */
    function downloadData(filename, data) {
        const file = new File([data], { type: 'text/json' });
        const elem = document.createElement('a');
        elem.href = URL.createObjectURL(file);
        elem.download = filename;
        elem.click();
    }
    let searchEngines = []
    let searchElement = document.querySelector('settings-ui').shadowRoot
        .querySelector('settings-main').shadowRoot
        .querySelector('settings-basic-page').shadowRoot
        .querySelector('settings-search-page').shadowRoot
        .querySelector('settings-search-engines-page').shadowRoot
        .querySelectorAll('settings-search-engines-list')
    for (let i = 0; i < searchElement.length; i++) {
        searchElement[i].shadowRoot.querySelectorAll('settings-search-engine-entry')
            .forEach($el => searchEngines.push({
                name: $el.shadowRoot.querySelector('#name-column').textContent,
                keyword: $el.shadowRoot.querySelector('#keyword-column').textContent,
                url: $el.shadowRoot.querySelector('#url-column').textContent
            }))
    }
    downloadData('search_engines.json', JSON.stringify(searchEngines));
}());
(async function importSEs() {
    /* Auxiliary function to open a file selection dialog */
    function selectFileToRead() {
        return new Promise((resolve) => {
            const input = document.createElement('input');
            input.setAttribute('type', 'file');
            input.addEventListener('change', (e) => {
                resolve(e.target.files[0]);
            }, false);
            input.click();
        });
    }
    /* Auxiliary function to read data from a file */
    function readFile(file) {
        return new Promise((resolve) => {
            const reader = new FileReader();
            reader.addEventListener('load', (e) => {
                resolve(e.target.result);
            });
            reader.readAsText(file);
        });
    }
    const file = await selectFileToRead();
    const content = await readFile(file);
    const searchEngines = JSON.parse(content);
    searchEngines.forEach(({ name, keyword, url }) => {
        /* Actual search engine import magic */
        chrome.send('searchEngineEditStarted', [-1]);
        chrome.send('searchEngineEditCompleted', [name, keyword, url]);
    });
}());

Answer 11

Chrome 100, working import / export:

Note: All the other answers weren't working so here's a strategy to debug if this ever stops working:

1. Hijack chrome.send and then add a search engine and watch the logs:

let oldsend = chrome.send;
chrome.send = (...args) => {
   console.log("[chrome.send], message: %o, arguments: %o", args[0], args[1]);
   chrome.send(...args);
}

// Now add search engine and watch console logs, as of writing this is what's being called:
/*
chrome.send("searchEngineEditStarted", [-1]);
// Waits for you to click the save button, then:
chrome.send("searchEngineEditCompleted", ["Title", "keyword", "url with %s"]);
*/

2. Now just replicate this to import search engines
3. To export search engines find the element with the inspector, then right click and select "Copy JS path", then change the last .querySelector to .querySelectorAll and remove the :nth-of-type(__) from it. Now just do some element mapping.

Anyways, here are the working functions to import and export in Chrome 100:

Export:

function exportSearchEngines() {
    return [
        ...document
            .querySelector("body > settings-ui")
            .shadowRoot.querySelector("#main")
            .shadowRoot.querySelector("settings-basic-page")
            .shadowRoot.querySelector(
                "#basicPage > settings-section.expanded > settings-search-page"
            )
            .shadowRoot.querySelector(
                "#pages > settings-subpage > settings-search-engines-page"
            )
            .shadowRoot.querySelector("#activeEngines")
            .shadowRoot.querySelectorAll(
                "#containerWithCollapsibleSection > div > settings-search-engine-entry"
            ),
        ...document
            .querySelector("body > settings-ui")
            .shadowRoot.querySelector("#main")
            .shadowRoot.querySelector("settings-basic-page")
            .shadowRoot.querySelector(
                "#basicPage > settings-section.expanded > settings-search-page"
            )
            .shadowRoot.querySelector(
                "#pages > settings-subpage > settings-search-engines-page"
            )
            .shadowRoot.querySelector("#activeEngines")
            .shadowRoot.querySelectorAll(
                "#containerWithCollapsibleSection > iron-collapse > div > settings-search-engine-entry"
            ),
    ]
        .map((i) => i.shadowRoot.querySelector("div"))
        .map((i) => ({
            url: i.querySelector("#url-column").innerText,
            name: i.querySelector("#name-column").innerText,
            keyword: i.querySelector("#keyword-column").innerText,
        }));
}

Import:

async function importSearchEngine({name, keyword, url}){
    chrome.send("searchEngineEditStarted", [-1]);
    //The awaits are to prevent chrome from crashing. Don't mess with those.
    await new Promise(r => setTimeout(r, 100));
    chrome.send("searchEngineEditCompleted", [name, keyword, url]);
    await new Promise(r => setTimeout(r, 500));
}

Answer 12

I wrote a python script which loads definitions from JSON data. Now you can manage your configuration as code:

https://gist.github.com/ninowalker/9952bf435f8acffa3ef59d6c538ca165

This is idempotent (e.g. can be run multiple times; wont add duplicates by keyword).

Works with python2 and OSX. Can be modified to support other platforms.

Answer 13

This is how I do it (I don't remember where I found it).

1. Create a script export_chrome_search_engines.sh:

   #!/bin/sh
   
   DESTINATION=${1:-./keywords.sql}
   TEMP_SQL_SCRIPT=/tmp/sync_chrome_sql_script
   echo "Exporting Chrome keywords to $DESTINATION..."
   cd ~/.config/google-chrome/Default
   echo .output $DESTINATION > $TEMP_SQL_SCRIPT
   echo .dump keywords >> $TEMP_SQL_SCRIPT
   sqlite3 -init $TEMP_SQL_SCRIPT Web\ Data .exit
   rm $TEMP_SQL_SCRIPT
   

2. Create a script import_chrome_search_engines.sh:

   #!/bin/sh
   if ps -x | grep -v grep | grep Google\ Chrome > /dev/null; then
       echo "Close Chrome and try again..."
       exit 1
   fi
   
   SOURCE=${1:-./keywords.sql}
   #SOURCE=$1
   TEMP_SQL_SCRIPT=/tmp/sync_chrome_sql_script
   echo
   echo "Importing Chrome keywords from $SOURCE..."
   cd ~/.config/google-chrome/Default
   echo DROP TABLE IF EXISTS keywords\; > $TEMP_SQL_SCRIPT
   echo .read $SOURCE >> $TEMP_SQL_SCRIPT
   sqlite3 -init $TEMP_SQL_SCRIPT Web\ Data .exit
   rm $TEMP_SQL_SCRIPT
   

3. Make them executable:

   chmod +x export_chrome_search_engines.sh import_chrome_search_engines.sh 
   

4. To export, shut down Chrome and run:

   ./export_chrome_search_engines.sh
   cp ~/.config/google-chrome/Default/keywords.sql /tmp/
   

5. To import, shut down Chrome and run:

   cp /tmp/keywords.sql  ~/.config/google-chrome/Default
   ./import_chrome_search_engines.sh
   

Answer 14

On macOS you can use chrome_se_export.py to extract all search engine entries.

The script basically extracts all rows¹ from the keywords table of a Chrome configuration database and saves them as a JSON file.

The JSON file includes the entries listed in the sections Search engines, Site Search and Inactive shortcuts of the Manage search engines and site search page in Chrome Settings.

Alternatively you could also extract entries with sqlite3.²

sqlite3 ~/Library/Application\ Support/Google/Chrome/Default/Web\ Data 'select short_name, keyword, url from keywords;'

Analogous to this approach you could create a script to import the entries from the JSON file back into the database.

---

_{Tested with Chrome 113 on macOS Catalina 10.15.7}

_{1. Excluding entries without a search query term (%s), so you might want to remove if re.search(r'{searchTerms}', kw[4]) to include those. An entry that has a search term %s in the GUI should have a {searchTerms} in the url column of the keywords table in the database.}

^{2. Chrome must be closed or else the database will be locked. If you don't want to quit Chrome you could make a copy of the database.}

Answer 15

As of now, no you cannot. However, you can share bookmarks with your colleagues.

Link to Google Bookmark sharing as of now, Google App users are not able to share bookmarks, or lists of bookmarks.