Meet The Brillant New... Microsoft Edge

Forget everything you know about Microsoft’s web browser. Wayne Williams reveals why the revamped, Chromium-based Edge is a revelation and explains how to make the most of it

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The launch of a new or updated T browser from Microsoft has often been a non-event. Internet : Explorer, despite achieving a 95% share of the browser market at its : peak, was frequently criticised for : being buggy, derivative and unsafe > especially the notorious IE6. And although its replacement in Windows : 10 was a better browser, most of us > used Edge to download Chrome or Firefox, then never touched it again.

So why all the fuss about the new : version of Edge (bit.ly/edge492), due for release on 15 January? Well, this time we believe Microsoft has finally got it right, creating a browser that’s fast, secure, open-source and packed with useful features. By actively seeking the feedback of test users during the program’s development, the company has made Edge a worthy if not superior rival to Google and Mozilla’s browsers.

In this feature, we explain why you should forget everything you know about Edge and give the reinvented browser a chance.

Isn’t Edge rubbish, though?

The original version of Edge had a bad reputation that was mostly justified. When Microsoft first rolled out the browser with Windows 10, it was very much a work in progress. The interface was far from intuitive its Settings, Favourites and History appeared in weird flyout menus and, most bizarre of all, there was no address bar!

Edge heavily pushed the Bing search engine, too, without making it obvious how to switch to Google, which is the first thing most people using it would want to do. Even if you did change the default search engine, Bing would still appear in a number of places because it was hard-coded into the browser. Edge didn’t support add-ons either, which was ridiculous, and when that feature was finally added a year later, there were only a few extensions available for it (and not many users left to care).