Microsoft’s new and improved Edge web browser, which is based on the same Chromium engine as its arch rival Chrome, will now be automatically downloaded to users’ computers.
The original version of Edge was shipped by default with Windows 10, but it struggled to win over users, who mainly flocked to Google’s Chrome browser. In a bid to boost its popularity, Microsoft has rebuilt Edge using the same tech as Chrome, bringing a lot more functionality, better performance and access to thousands of existing Chrome extensions.
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It’s a big improvement, but before now you could only manually download the new version. However, Microsoft is now including it in a number of automatic updates for Windows 10, so if you’ve not downloaded it already, you will likely soon find the new Edge installed on your PC.
Welcome replacement
The new version of Edge will be included in the KB4541301, KB4541302 and KB4559309 updates for Windows 10, and these will be automatically downloaded on your PC.
While we’re not always fond of Microsoft forcing changes on users without them being able to do anything about it, the Chromium version of Edge is a genuine improvement over the existing one, and we’d recommend you moving to the new version to take advantage of the new features. Microsoft will also stop supporting the older version of Edge, and we recommend you never use an outdated, unsupported browser, as it may not get regular security updates.
However, you should know that unlike when you manually download the new version of Edge, with the automatic download, you won’t be able to switch back to the old version.
For people who really want to stick with the old version of Edge, the only option is to block those updates from automatically updating. Again, that’s not something we’d recommend.
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Via Ghacks
