Kiwix JS 4.3.0 is out - Theme overhaul and Quality of Life Improvements! - Kiwix
1 2 3

It’s already been almost five months since the last release: we’re excited to announce the arrival of Kiwix JS Browser Extension v4.3!

This release brings a complete reimagining of the dark/light theme system, making it smarter and more adaptive than ever before, together with improvements to archive loading, file-system management and numerous fixes. And to celebrate the release, you may spot a new official dedicated icon!

Main features and improvements:

🎨 Theme System Overhaul

  • Auto-detection of ZIM colour schemes with intelligent auto-switching (can be turned off in Configuration)
  • New dark/light/auto toggle button in the toolbar for quick theme changes
  • Native support for new Wikimedia ZIMs with built-in dark theme (ZIMs released since October 2025)
  • Experimental colour scheme detection for Zimit ZIMs
  • Popovers now adapt intelligently to theme switching (Wikimedia ZIMs)

📁 File Management & API Improvements

  • Directory refresh button for browsers with File System Access API (Chrome/Edge/Brave/Vivaldi/etc.)
  • Major overhaul of file/directory picking, loading, and launching across all supported APIs
  • Fixed multiple issues with archive selection and relaunching

✨ UI/UX Polish

  • Updated icons and branding
  • Thinner search bar for better screen real estate usage
  • Enter key now selects first search result, together with standard keyboard shortcuts for jumping to search (see About page in-app)
  • Better gesture detection and keyboard support for showing/hiding sliding toolbars

⚙️ LibZim Back End Progress

  • Popovers now work when experimental libzim backend is enabled
  • Better redirect handling
  • Various stability improvements for Zimit archives in libzim mode (see Expert Settings)

Plus numerous fixes for image/video rendering in dark mode, noscript handling in Restricted mode, and improved testing framework reliability.

📥 Download links:

Full changelog on GitHub