Regulators have lifted an order for the slot controversial wells near Blackpool to be capped with concrete.
Prime Minister Boris Johnson has been under pressure from Conservative MPs to end a 2019 moratorium on fracking.
The move comes ahead of the publication of the government's delayed energy strategy.
The North Sea Transition Authority (NSTA) said the firm now had until the end of June 2023 to evaluate options for the Preston New Road and Elswick sites.Cuadrilla chief executive Francis Egan said:
I would like to thank the Prime Minister and the Business Secretary [Kwasi Kwarteng] for seeing the light and realising - just in time - how absurd it would have been to force us to pour concrete down Britain's only two viable shale gas wells in the middle of an energy crisis.
