Internet Explorer has one foot in the grave, but Microsoft has decided to allow customers to choose when the last scraps of its old (and mostly unloved) web browser will be removed from their devices and final goodbyes can be had.
This comes after Internet Explorer was disabled on some Windows 10 devices when users installed a Microsoft Edge (the new default web browser for Windows) update released in mid-February. Microsoft warned from June to December last year that the legacy browser would be permanently disabled via a Windows update.
According to a brief announcement from Microsoft, “Organizations will continue to maintain control over determining the timing to remove Internet Explorer visual references from their device, if they haven’t already done so, by using the Disable IE policy.”
Despite the reference to ‘organizations’, individual users can also make use of this option.
Time’s up
Since the February Edge update removed Internet Explorer 11, users have been told that “the future of Internet Explorer is on Microsoft Edge. Internet Explorer has been retired and is no longer supported.”
Internet Explorer has been automatically launching Microsoft Edge when visiting incompatible sites since October of 2020. The complete list of incompatible sites currently contains 7,604 sites and includes Microsoft Teams, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and Google Drive.
Microsoft is urging users to make the switch to Microsoft Edge, so if you’ve been clinging to Internet Explorer it may be time to say goodbye. At least you’ll be able to decide exactly when you hold the funeral