How to uninstall Google Chrome on a Mac

Removing the app

Google's own steps for a Mac are the ordinary ones, and there is no separate Chrome uninstaller to download:

1. Right-click Chrome in the Dock and choose Quit. Chrome cannot be fully removed while it is running.
2. Open Finder and go to Applications. If Chrome is not there, use File → Find and search for "Google Chrome".
3. Drag Google Chrome to the Trash, then empty the Trash.

That is the whole of the app. Everything Chrome wrote while you used it is somewhere else, and the Trash does not touch it.

Where Chrome keeps everything else

• ~/Library/Application Support/Google/Chrome — your profiles: bookmarks, history, saved passwords, the cookies that keep you signed in to sites, autofill and extensions. Chrome also keeps its on-device AI models here, in OptGuideOnDeviceModel and two smaller folders beside it.
• ~/Library/Application Support/Google/GoogleUpdater — Google's updater, which keeps Chrome up to date, with the update packages it has already downloaded in crx_cache.
• ~/Library/Caches/Google — the web cache: temporary copies of pages, images and scripts.
• ~/Library/LaunchAgents — the files that start Google's updater on its own schedule. They are named after Google, so a search for the name finds them.

The ~ is your home folder. In Finder, press Shift-Command-G and paste a path to go straight there.

How much it is taking

Before deleting anything, see what the pieces weigh. In Terminal:

du -sh ~/Library/Application\ Support/Google ~/Library/Caches/Google 2>/dev/null

The first figure is the profile and updater together; the second is the cache. If Terminal reports that it cannot read a folder, give it Full Disk Access in System Settings → Privacy & Security, or check the folder's size in Finder with File → Get Info.

Removing the leftovers by hand

1. The cache. Move ~/Library/Caches/Google to the Trash. With Chrome gone, nothing reads it.
2. The profile. Google's own instructions, as an optional last step, are to go to ~/Library/Application Support/Google/Chrome, select all the folders, and drag them to the Trash. Do this only after the next section.
3. The updater. List Google's launch agents with the command below, move any that remain to the Trash, and restart. Then move ~/Library/Application Support/Google/GoogleUpdater to the Trash too.

ls ~/Library/LaunchAgents | grep -i google

System Settings → General → Login Items & Extensions → Allow in the Background lists helpers by the app that installed them, which is a quick check that Google's updater is no longer registered. For any other piece you are unsure of, the leftover files after uninstalling an app covers each place an app leaves things and how to find them by name or bundle ID.

What to keep before the profile goes

• Passwords. A saved password that is not synced to your Google account exists only in that profile folder. While Chrome is still installed, open Google Password Manager from its menu, choose Settings, and use Export passwords to save them to a file.
• Bookmarks. In Chrome's Bookmark Manager, choose Export Bookmarks to save them as an HTML file, which another browser can import.
• Other Google apps. The Google folder in Application Support can be shared with other Google software you still use, so remove the Chrome and GoogleUpdater folders rather than the whole of it.

If you are signed in to Chrome and save data to your Google account, some of it also stays on Google's servers after the profile folder is gone, as Google's help says. Deleting the folder on the Mac does not delete that copy; Chrome's own delete-browsing-data settings and your Google account do.

Why it grows back

If you are reinstalling Chrome rather than leaving it, the space returns with it. The cache refills as you browse, the updater downloads each new version before installing it, and Chrome downloads its AI model again the first time a feature that uses it is turned on. A profile you kept is picked up again on reinstall, which is the reason to keep it if you might come back. If the aim was space rather than getting rid of Chrome, clearing its cache in place is often enough: how to clear the cache on a Mac has the steps.

Where the app comes in

RefreshYourMac measures Chrome in separate pieces, each with its own rating. Google Chrome Cache is rated Safe for auto removal: temporary copies of web pages, images and scripts, with your passwords, sign-ins, history and bookmarks stored elsewhere and not affected. Google Updater Downloads, also Safe for auto removal, takes the update packages Google has already downloaded and the updater's old logs, and never removes the updater itself. Leftover Browser Copies lists the spare copies of Chrome left in the system's temporary folder whenever it is force-quit, crashes or updates while open, which restarting your Mac does not remove. Google Chrome AI Model, rated Review before deleting, removes the on-device AI models, which Chrome downloads again only when a feature that needs them is next used.

Google Chrome Passwords & Sign-ins is the profile folder, and the app never deletes it: removing it would sign you out of every site and lose any passwords not synced to your Google account, so it is measured and shown with what to do instead. That part stays a hand job, with the steps above. To remove Chrome itself, Unused Applications lists apps you have not opened recently, largest first, and moves the ones you choose to the Trash; RefreshYourMac's Uninstall an App, described in how to uninstall apps on a Mac, finds an app's pieces by bundle ID before it goes; what an uninstaller app does covers the rest. Only the cache category is in the Mac App Store edition; the others are in the download.