Tech giant Google has announced that there will be a delay in phasing out third-party cookies. "We are providing an update on the plan for third-party cookie deprecation on Chrome," said Google in a post on Privacy Sandbox News.

The announcement was made on Tuesday, April 23, ahead of the quarterly reports from Google and the UK's Competition and Markets Authority (CMA).

Google cited challenges in the ad market in the absence of cookies and CMA's need for time to review results from industry tests as the reasons for the delay.

"We recognize that there are ongoing challenges related to reconciling divergent feedback from the industry, regulators and developers, and will continue to engage closely with the entire ecosystem.

"It's also critical that the CMA has sufficient time to review all evidence including results from industry tests, which the CMA has asked market participants to provide by the end of June. Given both of these significant considerations, we will not complete third-party cookie deprecation during the second half of Q4," it said.

The tech giant also upheld its commitment to engaging closely with the CMA and ICO and closing the process this year. Google also said that it envisions proceeding with the cookie deprecation starting early next year.

This is the third time that Google has delayed third-party cookie deprecation. The original deadline for the phase-out was January 2020.

Google repeatedly stated its intention to phase out cookies in Chrome by the end of 2024 and was actively developing alternative solutions like Privacy Sandbox to provide for targeted advertising and audience measurement. 

Google had previously committed to a firm timeline in 2023 with a phased approach supposed to start with 1% deprecation in January 2024 gradually increasing until eliminating 100% of third-party cookies in the second half of 2024.