Do not update your Chromebook right now or you might get locked out of it

What in the world is going on with the Chrome OS team this month??

What you need to know

• Reports of issues started flooding as Google pushed out Chrome OS update 91.0.4472.165 today.
• Impacted users cannot log back into their Chromebooks, so do not update your Chromebook.
• If your Chromebook asks to Restart to update, do not click Reboot and do not shut down your machine.
• Google is aware of the problem, and a fix should be deployed soon. However, if you're already locked out, you'll have to Powerwash your Chromebook to get back in.
• This is the second critical bug on the stable Chrome OS channel in less than a month.

Somehow, a major bug has slipped through three experimental channels and made its way into a Chrome OS stable channel — AKA the channel that the vast, vast majority of Chromebook owners are using. This bug is in Chrome OS 91.0.4472.165, and it is not allowing users to log back into their Chromebooks after the update.

If the update has downloaded but installation has not finished, do not shut down your Chromebook. The update will install on your next reboot or system shutdown.

Google seems to be aware of the situation and should be working on a fix soon, but the update hasn't been pulled yet, it seems, so don't go to the About Chrome OS screen, do not check for updates, and do not shut down your Chromebook if you can help it.

Users who unfortunately got the update first are indeed locked out of their machines, at least until they Powerwash them. Once impacted users factory reset their Chromebook, they can set it back up and get back in, but keep in mind this is a factory reset and will erase all local data and the Linux program data.

We're reaching out to Google to ask when they might have a timeline for the fix and how this has happened twice in such a short amount of time. We'll update this story as things progress.