Google is replacing Flash in Chrome once and for all

Google told us in May that it would eventually block Adobe Flash Player content on Chrome. And today, the company is making good on its promise. Google is making HTML5 the preferred and default way to display website content in a change that’ll take place over the next couple of months. This means that unless a website has an HTML5 content player, video content will not automatically display. All Flash content will be blocked, unless users manually enable it on a site-by-site basis.

At first, permission requests will only pop up on sites that users are visiting for the first time, but by October, every site will require user permission to run Flash. One percent of users on the current version of Chrome will see this feature. Everyone should have an updated Chrome by February, when the most recent beta version goes stable.

Google isn’t the first company to block Flash content. Last year, Facebook made every video on its website play in HTML5 by default across all browsers. Even Adobe told people to stop using Flash last year, so really, Google’s update is for the best.

Update 12/12, 9:52 AM ET: Updated to clarify wording about the feature rolling out — not HTML5 itself rolling out.