I wonder if User Agent Switcher might work? I am convinced that there is a conspiracy between Microsoft and softmaker companies to force people to W10/11. I have used it successfully to install things that are not supposed to work on W7. Not saying it works in all case, but certainly worth try.
I don't think it will. User Agent Switcher is a browser extension, but that doesn't help with Brave because what you download from the Brave website with your browser is just a downloader stub, not the actual Brave program. When you run the stub, you're no longer in the browser, and the stub (about 5MB) proceeds to download the full 100MB+ installer. The problem is the stub *always* downloads the current version, regardless of which version you thought you were downloading, and the current version does not support Win7 -- hence, the "unsupported" message.
You can download old versions of Brave Portable from Github. I believe v.1.47 was the last version that supported Win7. Scroll down to the 1.47.171 entry, and click the "Assets" drop-down. For the portable program, you want to download either the 100MB+ .7z file or the "..setup.exe" file (which will just self-expand into a self-contained folder). I think the 101MB "brave-installer.." might even be the non-portable variation, if that's your preference. Do *not* download the 4.53MB stub; that will do you no good.
Beware version 1.47 will give you a small Win7 nag warning at the top of the browser window every time you launch it. To suppress the annoying OS nag warning on Win 7/8.x, use regedit to add the following registry key:
[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Policies\BraveSoftware\Brave]
"SuppressUnsupportedOSWarning"=dword:00000001
I have done the registry key mod and I believe that mod may be responsible for a "Managed by your organization" flag in some areas incl Settings. Dunno that it otherwise affects anything important.
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Odd. I DLed the brave-installer and it didn't install. At least, when it was done I have the very same "About.." as I posted here the other day.
I've used solely portable versions of browsers for many years now, so I have very little familiarity with updating over the top of installed versions. (I just toss my portable version's folder and "update" by downloading a new one once or twice a year.)
That said, I did test the github brave-installer file in a clean virtual machine, and it didn't go through the usual installation wizard I would have expected. In my VM test, there was no wizard or outward indication that it did anything, but I found it had indeed added a Brave entry to the Start menu and it would launch and run. I found it odd that it installed it's files under "Program Data" instead of "Program Files", but since I don't normally use an installed version I don't know if that's normal.
So I'm not sure where that brave-installer file on the github page comes from, but it appears maybe it's different from the installer the official Brave website might have hosted back in the 1.47 era. Hard to fault github, though, since it is, after all, the *Portable* Brave github page.
On 3/20/24 I uploaded a Brave installer from GitHub for the latest version of Brave that will run on Windows 7, which I understand is 1.47.186.
Here is a link:
Release Release v1.47.186 (Chromium 109.0.5414.119) . brave/brave-browser . GitHub
There are links on that page to a bewildering number (128) of downloadable "Assets". The installer I downloaded doesn't indicate it is the 64-bit version and is simply called BraveBrowserStandaloneSetup.exe. I am running Win Pro 7-64 with service pack 1 and had no problem installing this.
I have been using Brave since then and like it quite a bit, and better than Chrome because of its privacy features. It also seems lighter on its feet ... faster to load up and cleaner. So far, so good.
Bad news, Brave will crash on Youtube unless you disable shields which means you will have to deal with annoying ads. They won't fix this for Windows 7.
Yeah, I already figured that one out. Every single YouTube video caused an immediate crash. It was odd, because I installed and began using Brave on March 20th, and it worked great and was my preferred browser until April 2nd. That is when every YouTube video caused an immediate crash upon opening.
So I did some research and many, many people who were running version 1.47.186 (last version to run on Win 7) or earlier had this problem. There were so many that the guy who was handling messages about this on Brave Community got frustrated with it and aggregated them all into a single humongous thread.
Aggregate Topic: Outdated Brave crashing on YouTube - Browser Support - Brave Community
He seemed like a nice guy but his feeling seems to be that if one "refuses to upgrade" one should not complain, which is a wee bit like saying "There is a problem with your Brave climate control system, which we have decided not to support. Instead, we want you to buy a new car."
Apparently there has been a change in the way ads are delivered that occurred after version 1.47.86 was released and the Brave ad blocking code needed to be updated, which was done. But we of the Windows 7 world cannot run the latest version, so the recommended solution is to turn off Shields in Brave Settings. Shields is one of the major reasons I wanted to use Brave. Jeesh.
So I created a second profile in Brave to test various setting changes in Shields by turning everything off and then turning them back on one at a time. What I found was that "Trackers and ads blocking" was the culprit. So if I want to run YouTube videos I can switch profiles and run with that feature turned off.
Another suggestion was to leave ad and tracker blocking on and instead go into Privacy and Security\Site and Shields Settings. Click on "Shields status", Shields Down\Add, , enter "https://www.youtube.com" in the dialog box, and press Add. Then blocking is off only for that site and any other site added to the list.
Of course, if Google isn't being blocked there isn't much point in having ad and tracker blocking, is there? I use Adblock Plus on Chrome and may choose to add that extension to Brave. I don't know if it handles tracker blocking, though.
(emphasis mine -- I think it depends on how much earlier we're talking about.)
Interesting! I had wondered what happened to my Brave, and thought mine had just become corrupted somehow. I assumed it was just me.
I only use portable versions of my browsers, but had been satisfactorily using Brave Portable 1.47.171 for quite some time. I had no problems until sometime within the last few weeks, when seemingly random crashes started. I first noticed it on some utility company websites, but later realized it was YouTube, as well.
I started troubleshooting. To rule out conflicts with other software, I tested with a pristine, new Win7 install in a VM. Brave 1.47.171 still crashed. I restored the VM so it was fresh again, and tried version 1.43.89. That worked perfectly. No crashes. I tried several earlier versions, as well, and none of them crashed, either.
My conclusion is the problem was introduced by some change in Brave after 1.43. It looks like whatever problem was introduced may have remained hidden for several months until it was triggered by a more recent change in ad tech, as you've suggested.
So I deleted 1.47 and replaced it with 1.43, migrating all my settings and extensions. Everything is working perfectly again.
If you decide to test the portable 1.43 version for yourself, I'm pretty sure you don't have to uninstall 1.47 first but I'm less sure if pre-existing Brave entries in the registry might conflict. (Since I only use portable versions, there are no permanent Brave entries in my registry to begin with.) If 1.43 still doesn't work for you, perhaps try temporarily renaming the Brave registry branch during your testing to see if that makes any difference.
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