Zorin OS 17.3 freezes upon the Google Chrome browser start

[Aleksiy]

Zorin OS 17.3 freezes when starting the Google Chrome browser. Only a hard reset (remove the power) brings it back to life. Everything worked fine till some system updates in late July, early August 2025. Tried all methods suggested in the previous topic to no avail. The only possible solution to fix the problem, which I did not try, was a suggestion to switch to Xorg. Instead, I installed Firefox, which is working so far. But I would like to restore Google Chrome as I have it on other PC and mobile devices and it synchronized on all devices.

[Aravisian]

Another user mentioned this recently as well:

Chrome-based browsers causing Zorin OS to crash

Chrome-based browsers, including Google Chrome, Edge and Brave, are causing Zorin OS to crash or freeze. This is happening to me, using Chromium and Edge browsers and the only way around it for me is to use the Opera browser. I am currently using Zorin OS 17.3Core

So, I am cross linking so readers see that this is not an isolated case.

@Aleksiy

The only possible solution to fix the problem, which I did not try, was a suggestion to switch to Xorg.

If you are intent on staying on Wayland, you can try using a chrome flag to force only Chrome to fallback to Xwayland:

chrome --disable-features=UseOzonePlatform

You might also disable Hardware Acceleration:
chrome --disable-gpu

If those work, you can set them as the exec= line in its desktop file (elevate to root, then navigate to /usr/share/applications and open the google-chrome .desktop file with a text editor):
google-chrome-stable --ozone-platform=x11 --disable-gpu

I only covered the Wayland option as it is the one you say you have not tried - and you had a while to try things...

[merinos]

Same problem with Zorin version 18 in beta.

And with Chromium in snap version, how do we do it?

[merinos]

That's an idea...

Would a charitable soul agree to give us the various commands needed to change the graphics server?

... please.

[Forpli]

You need no terminal commands to switch to Xorg. Logout and at login click on your username, then a cog wheal appears at the bottom right of the screen. There select "Zorin Desktop on Xorg". Afterwards login with your password. This setting will be kept until you change it back to Zorin Desktop (which uses Wayland).

To set flags you can go to the flags settings in your browser. These pages are a bit older but I think the options are still there:

Enable Wayland Support for Firefox/Chrome in Ubuntu 22.04 for Better...

Ubuntu's Chromium Snap Now Allows Enabling Native Wayland Support

[merinos]

Thanks for the info.

But, after going through Xorg, I found this two-step solution (on the beta of Zorin 18):