Google Chrome redirecting localhost to https

I believe this is caused by HSTS - see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTTP_Strict_Transport_Security

If you have (developed) any other localhost sites which send a HSTS header...

eg. Strict-Transport-Security: max-age=31536000; includeSubDomains; preload

...then depending on the value of max-age, future requests to localhost will be required to be served over HTTPS.

To get around this, I did the following.

• In the Chrome address bar type "chrome://net-internals/#hsts"
• At the very bottom of a page is QUERY domain textbox - verify that localhost is known to the browser. If it says "Not found" then this is not the answer you are looking for.
• If it is, DELETE the localhost domain using the textbox above
• Your site should now work using plain old HTTP

This is not a permanent solution, but will at least get it working between projects. If anyone knows how to permanently exclude localhost from the HSTS list please let me know :)

UPDATE - November 2017

Chrome has recently moved this setting to sit under Delete domain security policies

UPDATE - December 2017 If you are using .dev domain see other answers below as Chrome (and others) force HTTPS via preloaded HSTS.