Prepare to publish: set up payment and distribution

In the Distribution tab you can declare if your extension is free or contains in-app purchases. You can also choose who will see it on the Chrome Web Store.

Screenshot of the Chrome Web Store payment and distribution page

Declaring in-app purchases

If you plan to use a third party service to offer additional paid features or subscriptions, chooseContains in-app purchases. This option will display an "in-app purchases" badge on your extension's detail page. Consider addingtest instructions so the Chrome Web Store quality reviewers can fully test any premium features.

Setting the visibility

Use theVisibility settings to configure who can see your item in the Chrome Web Store:

  • Public—This option lists your item on the Chrome Web Store for all users to see and install.
  • Unlisted—This option does not create a listing on the Chrome Web Store, but does allowsanyone to install your item if they know its Chrome Web Store URL.
  • Private—This option limits installation of your item to specified users only. This istypically used for testing before public launch of an item.
Key point: All visibility settings have the same policy requirements and will go through the samereview process.

Private visibility: Trusted testers

Private allows your trusted testers to install the item. You designate trusted testers by listingthem in your account settings in the developer dashboard. Each email should be associated with aGoogle account which will be able to view and install your item on the Chrome Web Store.

Note: The trusted testers list is associated with youraccount, and not an individual item. To createmultiple trusted tester accounts, you must use separate accounts. However, you can alsoadd groups to your private listing, on a per-item basis.

The following screenshot shows some trusted tester accounts listed in a Chrome Web Store developeraccount page:

Screenshot showing trusted tester accounts listed in a Chrome Web Store developer account page

Private visibility: Google Groups

In addition to your trusted tester accounts, you can also include any Google Groups that you own ormanage:

Screenshot showing groups added to private visibility

Any members of the specified groups, along with your trusted testers, will be able to install theitem.

Private visibility: domain publishing

Note: This feature is only available for Google Workspace domains where it has been enable by the domainadministrator.

If domain publishing is enabled for your organization, an additional option appears in thedistribution page of the developer console:

Screenshot showingthe domain publishing option in the developer console

SeeEnterprise publishing options for an overview of this and otherenterprise extension topics, along with links to other enterprise extension documentation.

Setting the geographic distribution

TheDistribution setting lets you specify which geographic areas will see your item listing inthe Chrome Web Store. You can either:

  • SelectAll regions to display your item to the entire world.
  • Select individual countries to publish to—this is useful for items with a regional focus orrelevance.

When you publish to the world, your item will be immediately visible to the region(s) you select,and it'll be visible in the store's search results.

Publish to specific regions

To publish to specific regions, clearAll regions and select thespecific regions you would like your item to be available in.

Publish to all regions with exclusions

To publish to all regions with exclusions, make sureAll regions isselected. Then, manually clear regions you would like to exclude.

Publishing a test version

You can publish a "BETA" or "TESTING" version to the Chrome Web Store in parallel with aproduction version. It can be listed private, unlisted or public. After addressing issues and bugs based on userfeedback, you can publish a revised version of your extension to the rest of your users.

Before you submit a testing version to the Chrome Web Store, follow these steps:

  1. Add the label "DEVELOPMENT BUILD" or “BETA” at the end of the name of your extension.
  2. Declare thepurpose of your extension in the description: "THIS EXTENSION IS FOR BETA TESTING".
Warning: Make sure to add these labels. If you don't, then both extensions may be taken down. For more information,seeRepetitive Content Spam Policy.

You are ready to submit this item!

After filling out theListing tab and thePrivacy tab, you can nowpublish your item.

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Last updated 2020-12-07 UTC.