Chromium browser not installing

Question

To install the Chromium browser, I type:

sudo apt install chromium-browser

But then I get several errors. What happens after is below:

Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree 
Reading state information... Done
You might want to run 'apt-get -f install' to correct these:
The following packages have unmet dependencies:
 chromium-browser : Depends: libnss3 (>= 2:3.22) but 2:3.21-1ubuntu4 is to be installed
 Depends: chromium-codecs-ffmpeg-extra (= 86.0.4240.75-0ubuntu0.16.04.1) but 76.0.3809.100-0ubuntu0.16.04.1 is to be installed or
 chromium-codecs-ffmpeg (= 86.0.4240.75-0ubuntu0.16.04.1) but it is not going to be installed
 Recommends: chromium-browser-l10n but it is not going to be installed
 google-chrome-stable:amd64 : Depends: libasound2:amd64 (>= 1.0.16)
 Depends: libatk-bridge2.0-0:amd64 (>= 2.5.3) but it is not going to be installed
 Depends: libatk1.0-0:amd64 (>= 2.2.0) but it is not going to be installed
 Depends: libatspi2.0-0:amd64 (>= 2.9.90) but it is not going to be installed
 Depends: libcairo2:amd64 (>= 1.6.0) but it is not going to be installed
 Depends: libcups2:amd64 (>= 1.4.0) but it is not going to be installed
 Depends: libdrm2:amd64 (>= 2.4.38) but it is not going to be installed
 Depends: libexpat1:amd64 (>= 2.0.1) but it is not going to be installed
 Depends: libgbm1:amd64 (>= 8.1~0) but it is not going to be installed
 Depends: libgdk-pixbuf2.0-0:amd64 (>= 2.22.0) but it is not going to be installed
 Depends: libgtk-3-0:amd64 (>= 3.9.10) but it is not going to be installed
 Depends: libnspr4:amd64 (>= 2:4.9-2~) but it is not going to be installed
 Depends: libnss3:amd64 (>= 2:3.22) but it is not going to be installed
 Depends: libpango-1.0-0:amd64 (>= 1.14.0) but it is not going to be installed
 Depends: libpangocairo-1.0-0:amd64 (>= 1.14.0) but it is not going to be installed
 Depends: libx11-6:amd64 (>= 2:1.4.99.1) but it is not going to be installed
 Depends: libx11-xcb1:amd64 but it is not going to be installed
 Depends: libxcb-dri3-0:amd64 but it is not going to be installed
 Depends: libxcb1:amd64 (>= 1.9.2) but it is not going to be installed
 Depends: libxcomposite1:amd64 (>= 1:0.3-1) but it is not going to be installed
 Depends: libxdamage1:amd64 (>= 1:1.1) but it is not going to be installed
 Depends: libxext6:amd64 but it is not going to be installed
 Depends: libxfixes3:amd64 but it is not going to be installed
 Depends: libxrandr2:amd64 but it is not going to be installed
 Recommends: libu2f-udev:amd64 but it is not installable
 Recommends: libvulkan1:amd64 but it is not going to be installed
E: Unmet dependencies. Try 'apt-get -f install' with no packages (or specify a solution).

Please Help.

• Stewart: Your problem is a difference in ubuntu suites. Can you add cat /etc/apt/sources.list /etc/apt/sources.list.d/* to your question?

Answer 1

This isn't an answer from Chromium specifically, but a general answer for this type of problem.

This problem appears when sources or suites start to get mixed with apt. Let's say you try to install chromium-browser. The Ubuntu bionic suite ships version 86.0.4240.75-0ubuntu0.18.04.1.

When you tried to install chromium-browser, you got a line that looked like this:

Depends: 
 chromium-codecs-ffmpeg-extra (= 86.0.4240.75-0ubuntu0.16.04.1) 
 but 76.0.3809.100-0ubuntu0.16.04.1 is to be installed
or
 chromium-codecs-ffmpeg (= 86.0.4240.75-0ubuntu0.16.04.1) 
 but it is not going to be installed

Bingo!

This means that your /etc/apt/sources.list or /etc/apt/sources.list.d/* contain sources that provide a different version of chromium.

When looking in official ubuntu repositories I found these versions:

• bionic: 86.0.4240.75-0ubuntu0.16.04.1
• xenial-updates: 86.0.4240.75-0ubuntu0.16.04.1
• xenial: 49.0.2623.108-0ubuntu1.1233

Since your version is between xenial and xenial-updates, it looks like you've found the package in an unofficial repository. This could be a problem caused by adding PPAs or sources from other distributions.

Here's my guess about what happened:

1. You have an updated apt release file with all of the latest packages from official ubuntu archives, but you also have a PPA in there which isn't maintained and is out of sync with official archives.
2. When you used apt install chromium-browser, apt found the preferred version in the bionic suite.
3. Apt tried to install the chromium-codecs-ffmpeg-extra or chromium-codecs-ffmpeg package. The highest priority hit it found was from this unmaintained PPA. Normally the highest-version found is selected, but in this case this PPA took priority. That might be because of pinning, or perhaps you have the xenial source selected for that PPA and xenial has priority over bionic on your machine.
4. When apt found this version in your priority source, it failed because that version fails to meet the dependency requirements.

See Don't make a FrankenDebian for why adding incompatible sources is a bad idea.

The solution is to clean up your /etc/apt/sources.list and /etc/apt/sources.list.d/*.

1. If you are using bionic remove all lines that are related to other releases (except bionic-security and bionic-updates).
2. If you are using PPAs, be sure that you actually need something from that PPA. Delete the PPA otherwise. If the PPA simply has newer versions of software: don't suffer from shiny new stuff syndrome. PPAs aren't trusted sources and can contain anything. Also they can become unmaintained at any time. Take the latest version in your official release.

Answer 2

run command to add the PPA:

sudo add-apt-repository ppa:xalt7x/chromium-deb-vaapi

Run command to "pin" the PPA to avoid installation of snap package in Ubuntu 20.04:

cat <<EOF | sudo tee /etc/apt/preferences.d/pin-xalt7x-chromium-deb-vaapi
Package: *
Pin: release o=LP-PPA-xalt7x-chromium-deb-vaapi
Pin-Priority: 1337
EOF

After that you can install the browser via:

sudo apt update
sudo apt install chromium-browser chromium-codecs-ffmpeg-extra 

P.S - To remove from source list

sudo add-apt-repository --remove ppa:xalt7x/chromium-deb-vaapi

• Stewart: Why recommend a PPA? Isn't chromium available from official repositories?