contextMenus

Use this API to provide functionality that is relevant to the user's current context without cluttering the browser's UI.

Examples:

• A search extension that adds a "Search on [My Site] for '%s'" item when text is selected (where %s is the selected text).
• An image-saving extension that adds a "Save image to [My Service]" item when a user right-clicks an image.
• A translation extension that can translate a selected block of text.

{
  "name": "My Context Menu Extension",
  "version": "1.0",
  "manifest_version": 3,
  "permissions": [
    "contextMenus"
  ],
  "background": {
    "service_worker": "background.js"
  }
}

Why is it not risky?

This is a very safe permission. It only allows an extension to add new options to the menu that appears when you right-click on a page (the "context menu").

For example, it might add a "Search for this image on..." option. By itself, this permission does not give the extension any ability to read the page you are on or access your personal data.

This example creates a context menu item that only appears when the user has selected text on a page. When clicked, it logs the selected text.

// background.js

// Create the context menu item upon installation.
chrome.runtime.onInstalled.addListener(() => {
  chrome.contextMenus.create({
    id: "logSelection",
    title: "Log selected text",
    contexts: ["selection"] // Only show when text is selected
  });
});

// Add a listener for when a context menu item is clicked.
chrome.contextMenus.onClicked.addListener((info, tab) => {
  if (info.menuItemId === "logSelection") {
    // 'info.selectionText' contains the text that was selected.
    if (info.selectionText) {
      console.log("Selected text:", info.selectionText);
    }
  }
});

In a real extension, instead of just logging the selected text, you might send it to a remote service, search it on a specific website, or use it to perform some other context-aware action.