Support for Microsoft’s Edge browser is ending today — not the new Chromium-based one, but the original Edge that was built as a replacement for Internet Explorer 11. Microsoft now calls it Legacy Edge, and the company announced it would be discontinuing the product back in August. That day has finally come: Legacy Edge will no longer receive security updates, and anyone still using it should start the process of switching to something else.
Legacy Edge was originally codenamed “Spartan” and was included with Windows 10 as the operating system’s default web browser before it was officially named Edge. The Edge mantle is being taken up by Microsoft’s Chromium-based browser, which was in beta throughout 2019 and officially launched in January 2020. This means Edge (the old Edge, that is) survived just over a year alongside its replacement. Microsoft also says Legacy Edge will automatically be removed by the April Windows 10 update, with the new Edge being installed in its stead.
If you’re the tech support person for your family, it’s worth checking in with your relatives to make sure Microsoft successfully bullied them into switching to the new Edge. If, somehow, it’s not installed on their computers (or your computer), you can download it directly from Microsoft’s website.
The death of Legacy Edge is bittersweet in some ways. By most metrics, the new Edge is vastly superior, but it does put the final nail in the coffin of Microsoft’s custom web-rendering engines, the history of which stretches back to early versions of Internet Explorer. It probably won’t be missed, given its… performance, but it’s still the end of an era. The old Edge is officially gone, and the new Edge has fully replaced it.
