That’s the cause of the issue, which I was eventually able to figure out. How it presents itself is that the browser crashes seemingly randomly when typing in the address bar.
**How can this issue be reproduced?
**
Enter “:>” into the address bar, or type text in it (less consistent).
**Expected result:
**
That this doesn’t happen lol
**Brave Version( check About Brave):
**
1.86.146
**Additional Information:
**
This has been happening to me ever since I updated to the 1.86.146 version on Mac. It was really confusing at first because I don’t even use quick commands and the pattern wasn’t obvious at all. Sometimes, it would crash with just one letter. Sometimes, after a few. Sometimes, it wouldn’t crash at all.
I figured out that the crash didn’t happen when I highlighted text and clicked “Search Brave for” as well as when I started typing in the address bar using “/” before any text, so I knew it had something to do with the data that the address bar specifically accesses. So I tried SEVERAL different things before narrowing down on quick command suggestions. Turning that off fixed the issue, and to confirm, I typed “:>” which crashes it 100% of the time.
Crash Report:
Crash from Sunday, February 1, 2026 at 4:02:01 PM
Uploaded Crash Report ID: 3c840500-886a-300f-0000-000000000000
Given MacOS and Brave Browser v1.86.146, Brave Browser will crash when typing into the URL address field: :> ← crashes “100% of the time” (or typing text ← less consistent)
OP tested and concluded, that Disabling “quick command suggestions” ← fixes the issue.
@289wk are you seeing this behavior as well? Not crashing for me one macOS using the latest build w/quick commands enabled.
@fishwoddy can you try testing this in a fresh browser profile or a guest profile and tell me if this still occurs? Make sure you close your original profile window before testing.
In a Brave Browser Private Window, or not private, either way, nothing happens. If typed into one of those windows, followed by selecting the other window, then :> vanishes from the former window. Also, not getting any crashes by typing a string of words into the URL address field.
Will see if anyone else can reproduce this. In the meantime I’m quite curious to know if @fishwoddy can reproduce this in a fresh profile w/no extensions or data. Will file an issue if so. If not then the crash is likely being caused by an extension or some bad data in the main profile.