Microsoft Will Put Internet Explorer Out of Its Misery Next Year
If you first hopped on the internet in the 90s, chances are that Internet Explorer was your first browser. Microsoft did everything it could to make sure that was the case, which got it in hot water with regulators. It didn’t even do Microsoft any good over the long haul. Internet Explorer fell behind more capable browsers like Chrome and Firefox ages ago, and Microsoft is .
Microsoft released Internet Explorer in 1995, and it was the company’s primary internet product all the way through the launch of Edge in 2015. That was only six years ago, but that’s an eternity on the internet.
Microsoft is framing this as a transition to Edge rather than the end of Internet Explorer. It points out that Edge has better compatibility with the modern web, better productivity features, and improved security. The new isn’t the most popular browser in the world, but at least it runs on modern technology.
This joke has nothing to do with this story. Life is just too short not to mock Internet Explorer. (Source unknown)
Anyone still using Internet Explorer 11 at home can continue to do so for now. Microsoft isn’t pulling the plug immediately, but support will end on June 15, 2022. That means no more updates or security patches. The longer you use IE beyond that date, the riskier it will become. The web will also continue moving on without IE, making it an even worse experience than it already is.
You don’t need to wait for the big day next year to switch. Anyone who is still, for some reason, using Internet Explorer should make the switch to Edge as soon as humanly possible. Luckily, Windows 10 should have Edge installed already, so the transition will be quick for people using the roughly 1 billion systems running Microsoft’s latest software. Microsoft says the process of moving to Edge should be painless, as it can import your bookmarks, history, passwords, settings, and even sign-in state for websites. Edge even has an IE mode that can run websites designed specifically for Microsoft’s old browser, which should be very few sites these days.
Now read: