Upgrading Chromium version inside Hexnode Kiosk Browser? (Stuck on v110)Solved

Hey man,

You can’t manually bump the Chromium version yourself. Hexnode bakes a specific Chromium build directly into their Kiosk Browser releases. Since v7.2 is their latest right now, 110 is what we get until they push a major update to the app itself. Reinstalling is good practice to make sure you aren’t on an old cache, but it won’t jump the Chromium version past what they’ve packaged.

Out of curiosity, what’s the ultimate goal here? Why the strict requirement for 111+?

Ah, that’s a bummer.

The web app we are deploying uses some newer web APIs that just flat-out break on Chromium 110. The strict requirement, though, is that I need to force this webpage in a Kiosk mode that completely stops the user from opening new tabs, typing in other URLs, or escaping to other apps. The Hexnode browser was perfect for trapping them on that one page. If I just swap to a normal browser to get the newer Chromium engine, I lose that kiosk lockdown.

Gotcha! Actually, you don’t have to use the proprietary Hexnode Kiosk Browser to get a locked-down kiosk experience. You can totally have your cake and eat it too here.

You can deploy the standard Google Chrome app instead. Because it’s a managed app, you can use Hexnode’s App Configurations to lock it down.

If you push a Managed App Config to Chrome, you can set up an URL allowlist. Just whitelist your single required URL and block * (everything else). It essentially traps the user on that one page just like a kiosk, but you get the benefit of the standard Chrome app automatically updating to the latest Chromium version.

(Side note: you can also look into Hexnode Browser Lite if your site supports it, but standard Chrome with App Configs is usually bulletproof for this).