Overview

Firebase Extensions help you reduce time spent on development, maintenance, and growth of your app.

When you find a Firebase Extension that solves a need for your app or project, all you do is install and configure the extension. With extensions, you don't spend time researching, writing, and debugging the code that implements functionality or automates a task for your app or project.

To install or manage extensions, you need to be a project Owner.

Official Firebase extensions

Firebase creates and tests the collection of official Firebase extensions. These extensions are reliable and secure.

Browse official Firebase extensions

Browse official Firebase extensions from the following sources:

Note that you can also browse official Firebase extensions in the Firebase Extensions source repository. In this source repository, you can view the source code for each extension.

View the source code of an extension

For all the official Firebase extensions, you can sign into the Firebase Extensions source repository to view their source code.

Contents of an extension's source code

You can inspect the contents of an extension's source directory, which includes:

  • extension.yaml file — Contains the metadata for the extension and defines the resources created, the Google APIs used, and the access roles required for operation

  • functions directory — Contains the files for the source code for the extension

  • README file — Lists the metadata for the extension (but in more human-readable format) as well as the content from the PREINSTALL file

  • PREINSTALL file — Describes how the extension works, any necessary pre-installation tasks, configuration requirements, and details about the extension

  • POSTINSTALL file — Describes specific usage instructions and any further integration requirements

Resources for an extension

Every Firebase project contains several types of "resources". Project resources can include things like deployed Cloud Functions, database instances, and Storage buckets.

When you install an extension, Firebase creates new extension-specific resources (for example, a set of functions) in your project. These resources are defined in the extension's specification file, extension.yaml, and are required by the extension to operate. For most extensions, these extension-specific resources are Cloud Functions (specifically, the resource type firebaseextensions.v1beta.function).

Note that, if you uninstall an extension, all the resources that Firebase created specifically for that instance of the extension to operate (like a set of functions) are deleted. However, the following are not deleted:

  • Any artifacts created by the extension (like stored images).

  • Any other resources in your project, like a database instance or Storage bucket. Even if the extension interacted with these other resources, they are not extension-specific, so they aren't deleted if the extension is uninstalled.

Using the Firebase console or the Firebase CLI

You can install and manage any of the official Firebase extensions using either the Firebase console or the Firebase CLI.

Action Firebase console Firebase CLI
View detailed information (pre-installation)
Install
View configuration (post-installation)
Edit configuration
Update version
Uninstall

Next Steps