Annoying Dino 2.0 is the rebuilt version of Annoying Dino, a free Chrome extension that puts a mischievous dinosaur on any webpage. Version 2.0.0 reached the Chrome Web Store on August 30, 2026, three days after the plan post went up saying that nothing in the plan had been built. This post is the build.
What changed from 1.1.0
Almost everything under the skin, and most of what is on it. The 1.1.0 dino was one silhouette walking at a constant speed on a fixed-timer leg cycle, which is why his feet skated. In 2.0.0:
- A new motion system. Real acceleration instead of a straight line at constant speed. The walk cycle is locked to distance travelled, so the feet no longer skate. Squash and stretch on the body, and spring physics on the head and tail so they follow a turn instead of snapping.
- New rigged artwork and five species. The single-path silhouette is gone; the dino is a layered rig that can be posed, and there are five species to pick from.
- Eggs, pterodactyls and jokes reworked. The three systems that made 1.1.0 feel small have been rebuilt rather than extended.
- Volcanoes and meteors. Both are new. The plan post noted that 1.1.0 had no meteor code at all, so the meteor was written from nothing, exactly as the plan assumed.
- Page interaction. The dino now uses the page instead of walking over a page he cannot see.
- The wardrobe, unlocks and fossil-record stats. A reason to leave it on past the first laugh.
What did not change
The permission set. Version 2.0.0 declares the same three permissions as 1.1.0 and nothing was added. That was the second of the two questions the plan refused to answer for me: making the dino survive page navigation would have needed a permission on all URLs, which shows every existing user a warning at update time. The answer was no, and the shipped build honours it. The dino is still started per page from the popup, and he still does not collect anything, phone anywhere, or run analytics.
The plan versus the build
The plan post carried a symptom-to-cause table. The first three rows were the ones I could describe from using the thing: feet skate, motion feels robotic, looks flat. The store description for 2.0.0 answers each one in order, in the same terms the table used: a walk cycle locked to distance, acceleration with squash and stretch and springs, a rig instead of a single path. The rows about eggs being just a timer and there being no world map to the reworked eggs and the page-interaction layer. That is the value of writing the plan first: the release notes can be checked against it line by line.
How to get it
Install it free from the Chrome Web Store. Visit any regular website, click the Annoying Dino icon in the extensions bar and press START DINO. Pick a hat from the popup. To send him away, press VAPORIZE DINO. Sound starts after your first click on the page, and all sound and animation pause when you switch tabs.
Questions people ask
Did Annoying Dino 2.0 add any permissions?
No. Version 2.0.0 declares the same three permissions as 1.1.0. The dino is still started per page from the popup and does not take a permission on all URLs, so existing users see no new warning on update.
Does Annoying Dino collect any data or use the network?
No. Everything runs locally in your browser. There are no accounts, no analytics and no network requests, and the Chrome Web Store listing declares that no data is collected.
How do I start the dinosaur on a page?
Open any regular website, click the Annoying Dino icon in the extensions bar and press START DINO. Press VAPORIZE DINO to send him away. Sounds begin after your first click on the page, because browsers require an interaction before an extension may play audio.
Where this goes
The project page now carries the 2.0.0 entry in its change history. If the dino does something on your page that he should not, the popup has separate toggles for sound effects, dinosaur friends, joke deliveries and cursor chasing. More builds on the projects index and the full devlog index.
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