The ChromeOS 139 update has been revoked for now

Just a few days ago, we posted all about the new features rolling out with the ChromeOS 139 update. While not a massive feature drop, it was set to bring a couple of very useful tools like Desk Sync and the much-needed external touchscreen calibration tool.

But if you’ve been smashing that “Check for updates” button and coming up empty, there’s a very good reason. As of this morning, it appears that Google has completely revoked the ChromeOS 139 update for all devices.

What we’re seeing

When we want to see the real-time status of a ChromeOS rollout, we turn to a couple of key resources: the official Chromium Dash update tracker and the fantastic, community-driven cros.tech. As of this morning, both of these sites are showing the same thing: the stable channel rollout for M139 has been halted, and all devices are currently being served the older M138 build instead.

While Google hasn’t made an official statement on the matter, this sort of action is rare and usually points to the likely discovery of a critical bug. When Google pulls an update this completely after a roll-out has already begun, it’s a clear sign that a serious issue was found that could negatively impact a large number of users.

This could be anything from a security vulnerability to a bug that causes performance issues, boot loops, or major hardware incompatibility. Whatever the specific reason, it was clearly significant enough for Google to hit the emergency brake.

While it’s a bit of a bummer to have to wait longer for the new features in ChromeOS 139, this is ultimately the right move from Google. If a quality control process caught a potentially widespread problem, seeing them act quickly to prevent it from affecting users is a good thing. We’ll be keeping a very close eye on the update trackers and will be sure to let you all know as soon as a fixed version of ChromeOS 139 begins to roll out again.