My 2020 M1 MacBook Air nonetheless runs nicely, however conserving onerous drive area as years of information, media, and software program accumulate is a continuous problem. So I used to be miffed after I learn safety researcher Alexander Hanff’s May 4 report that Google Chrome has been routinely downloading an over-4GB AI mannequin known as Gemini Nano onto everybody’s pc, with out asking for consent or offering notification. Chrome just isn’t my foremost browser (I’m a Firefox diehard), and Gemini just isn’t my foremost AI (that may be Claude). I’m paying a hefty hard-drive tax for one thing I don’t use.
Merely deleting the file, known as weights.bin, is ineffective. Chrome simply downloads it once more. And a lot of the recommendation on get round that doesn’t work—not less than in my intensive testing.
Lots of what I focus on right here applies to each Macs and PCs, however the techiest recommendation is for Macs, as that’s the place it’s been most studied and the place I used to be finest capable of take a look at it.
Google added Gemini Nano in model 126 of Chrome, launched in June 2024. However Hanff’s intensive forensic reporting of the way it operates on a Mac introduced the difficulty heart stage this week, spawning a raft of tech recommendation articles. In response, Google issued a brief assertion saying that, in truth, there’s a easy toggle in Chrome to disable and take away Gemini Nano.
None of that recommendation may very well work in your system.
Gemini Nano is designed to hurry up in-browser AI options similar to enhancing writing and modifying by operating jobs in your pc, reasonably than sending your knowledge to Google’s cloud. You might discover this handy, and be joyful to maintain Gemini Nano put in. However if you happen to do need to ditch it, you might have to take extra sophisticated steps than what Google and the press have been telling you.
What didn’t work
An announcement Google despatched to me and the remainder of the media, reads, partially:
“In February, we started rolling out the flexibility for customers to simply flip off and take away the mannequin straight in Chrome settings. As soon as disabled, the mannequin will now not obtain or replace. Extra particulars in our help center article.”
It took almost two years for Google to start out “rolling out” the kill swap, and it seems to be a sluggish roll. I’ve examined the newest model of Chrome (V 148) in two installations on macOS 26 and one on Home windows 11. Solely the Home windows model has the brand new toggle, known as “On-device AI.” This does disable and take away the mannequin.
As for my Mac, a Google spokesperson declined to say something past the assertion or supply a way of after I may get the improve. I’m not alone. Some tech journalists who picked up the story did not have it. Now the web is buzzing with work-arounds for eradicating Gemini Nano that don’t really work—not less than not on my two macOS setups.
The recommendation being circulated facilities round Chrome “flags” that flip options on or off. You may get there by typing “chrome://flags” within the browser’s tackle bar. The frequent recommendation is to seek for and choose “Disabled” for a characteristic known as:
“Permits optimization information on machine
Permits the optimization information to execute fashions on machine. – Mac, Home windows, Linux, ChromeOS”
I made that change and in addition disabled flags for the six Gemini Nano providers (together with assist for writing, rewriting, proofing, and summarizing textual content). However a contemporary Gemini Nano shortly appeared.
What does work: a step-by-step information
In the event you don’t like the concept of Google claiming over 4GB of disk area, listed below are the steps, so as of complexity, to treatment the difficulty. (Google’s assertion does say that “the mannequin will routinely uninstall if the machine is low on assets,” with out offering extra particulars.)
Step 1. See you probably have the toggle
Begin by searching for the toggle in Chrome by clicking Settings > System or typing “chrome://settings/system” into the tackle bar. In the event you see “On-device AI,” merely toggle it off and restart Chrome. (Step 3 reveals affirm that it labored.)
In the event you don’t have the characteristic, examine that Chrome is updated. Go to Settings > About Chrome, or sort “chrome://settings/assist.” If the web page says that “Chrome is updated,” you’ve executed all you possibly can. Chrome will doubtless be on an iteration of Model 148, similar to “148.0.7778.97 (Official Construct).”
Step 2. Again up your pc
From right here onward, you can be digging into your working system, the place a mistaken step may trigger issues to interrupt. First, make a full-system backup with software program similar to Apple’s Time Machine.
Step 3. Search for Gemini Nano in your disk
Whether or not or not you may have the AI toggle in Chrome, you need to look to see if the information are in your disk.
On Macs, open a Finder window by clicking Cmd + N from the desktop, and press Cmd + Shift + . (the interval character) to disclose hidden system information. Then navigate to Customers > [your user name] > Library > Utility Assist > Google. Proper-click the “Chrome” folder, choose “Make Alias,” and drag the alias to your desktop so you will get again to it shortly later. Then click on the unique “Chrome” folder to see what’s inside.
On PCs, in File Explorer, go to Native Disk > This PC > [your user name] > AppData > Google > Chrome. Proper-click “Chrome” and choose Present extra choices > Create shortcut, and drag the shortcut to the desktop. Then click on Chrome > Person Information.
On both system, search for a folder known as OptGuideOnDeviceModel. Double-clicking will most likely deliver you to a folder with a quantity similar to “2025.8.8.1141.” Inside that, you will discover a number of information, together with weights.bin—the 4GB+ AI mannequin that makes up a lot of the package deal.
Step 4. Assess the state of affairs
If the OptGuideOnDeviceModel folder just isn’t current or is empty, it might be since you do have the toggle in Chrome, and it’s working. Or your system is just too outdated to run Gemini Nano. However click on that desktop shortcut periodically to see if something modifications.
If Gemini Nano is there, and also you aren’t snug digging into your macOS or Home windows innards, take into account different choices: Delete Chrome if eradicating Gemini Nano is extra essential to you than utilizing the browser, or simply stay with Gemini Nano if it’s not. Ultimately, you need to get the toggle to take away the AI mannequin.
In case you are keen to tinker, I’ll stroll you thru the method for macOS, the place there could also be extra want primarily based on my casual polling, and the place I used to be capable of totally take a look at. It’s additionally easier.
Step 5. Drive Chrome to cease re-downloading Gemini Nano
If Chrome doesn’t but provide the choice to take away the mannequin, you’ll need to manually delete it, then set macOS to cease Chrome from downloading Gemini Nano once more. This requires copying and pasting a single line of directions into the again finish of macOS.
Stop Chrome, then launch the Terminal app by clicking Purposes > Utilities > Terminal. You’ll see a black display screen with plain white textual content (or presumably the inverse). The final line will embody your username and a immediate. Mine appears like “seancaptain@Seans-Air ~ %.”
Copy this actual line, paste it into Terminal, and press Return:
defaults write com.google.Chrome GenAILocalFoundationalModelSettings -int 1
That “-int 1” half mainly says “Don’t set up Gemini Nano.”
This may look scary, however if you happen to sort one thing mistaken, Terminal will doubtless simply reject it and offer you an error message. If it really works, Terminal received’t present something. No information is sweet information
Warning: Theoretically, you could possibly restore Gemini Nano by getting into a barely completely different command (defaults delete com.google.Chrome GenAILocalFoundationalModelSettings). Nonetheless, that didn’t deliver it again for me in a number of checks, on a number of methods, over a number of hours. So Gemini Nano could also be gone indefinitely if you happen to take this step. (Or restore from backup if you happen to really feel regret.)
Step 6. Delete Gemini Nano
Click on your desktop shortcut to the Chrome folder, then drag the OptGuideOnDeviceModel folder into the Trash and empty the Trash. However go away the Chrome folder open so you possibly can keep watch over it.
Step 7. See if it labored
Launch the Chrome app. Then click on your desktop shortcut to the Chrome folder and watch to see if the OptGuideOnDeviceModel seems. If it’s nonetheless absent after an hour or so of utilizing Chrome, the method works. If it does reappear, repeat Steps 3 and 4.
This course of ought to ultimately stick. However because it goes past common shopper tech operations, there could also be quirks to your system that solely a professional or subtle consumer may diagnose. Thankfully, you made that system backup, proper?
Why ought to now we have to do that?
Google’s quiet bundling of Gemini Nano and sluggish rollout of the way to do away with it appear to have hit a nerve. Tech, particularly AI, is shifting quicker than most anybody can hope to maintain up with. Feelings run from concern (Will I lose my job? Are they spying on me?) to excessive annoyance (What are all these rattling pop-ups providing to assume for me?). These newest anxieties come atop years of distrust primarily based on tech corporations gathering knowledge they stated they didn’t, utilizing it in methods they stated they wouldn’t, and shedding it to hackers in methods they stated they couldn’t. All that frustration landed with a whopping 4GB thud this week.
Hanff was not a dispassionate reporter of this phenomenon. “You reached in to my machine, modified a configuration (the Chrome profile flags), and gave your self permission to put in one thing I didn’t authorize,” he wrote in a follow-up post on May 7. (I exchanged some emails with Hanff on technical points of the Gemini Nano set up and removing.) Each of his posts cite legal guidelines that he believes Google has violated by doing this, together with the European ePrivacy Directive, the EU and UK Normal Information Safety Rules, the California Client Privateness Act, and Chapter 9 of the Maltese Legal Code. Hanff additionally makes a strident ecological argument, calculating a value in further CO2 emissions of pushing out the software program starting from 6,000 to 60,000 metric tons (tonnes). I haven’t checked his math, however he publishes an in depth methodology.
There could also be an extended debate on the harms or advantages of the mass Gemini Nano deployment. However the scale in itself is noteworthy. An enormous firm, with an enormous consumer base, put out an enormous improve with comparatively tiny clarification and, till not too long ago, no strategy to undo it. It could be known as “Nano,” however this obtain is inflicting massive complications.
