Transfer custom search engines to a new Chrome profile

Jun 1, 2021

For some reason, Chrome does not have an easy way to share custom search engines between different account profiles.

Instead of manually copying each each search engine profile when setting up a new Google account, you can manually download and re-upload a JSON file containing your custom search engine settings.

The below scripts should be run from chrome://settings/searchEngines.

Step 1. Download 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));
}());

Step 2. Import the JSON file in the new profile.

(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]);
  });
}());

Note: the above scripts may break with future versions of Chrome. Check the below link if the above scripts do not work.

source: superuser.com

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