Microsoft has announced that the sun will finally set on its Internet Explorer and Edge Legacy web browsers next year, when the phase-out plans end. According to a new blog post from the company, Edge Legacy will end its life on March 9, 2021 (replaced by the much superior Edge Chromium), while Microsoft 365 Apps will end support for Internet Explorer 11 on August 17. 2021. After these times, users of unsupported browsers will experience a "degraded experience"; New Microsoft 365 features will not be available to latecomers, and existing web app features will be disabled.
Microsoft web browsers
Internet Explorer has long been the butt of jokes in the tech community, ridiculed for its speed issues and clunky user experience. The decline in the web browser's reputation is very significant in its market share, which currently sits at just 1.28% according to StatCounter data (versus 95% at its peak). The decision to kill the browser, which first appeared in 1995, can be seen as an admission of its growing irrelevance to modern users. “Customers have been using IE 11 since 2013, when the online environment was much less sophisticated than it is today. Since then, open web standards and newer browsers, like the new Microsoft Edge, have enabled better and more innovative online experiences,” Microsoft said. “We believe that Microsoft 365 subscribers, in both business and consumer contexts, will be well served by this change through faster and more responsive web access to larger feature sets in everyday tools like Outlook. , Teams, SharePoint and more. However, Microsoft will continue to honor investments made by companies in Internet Explorer. Although customers can no longer access Microsoft 365 Apps through the browser, all private IE 11 apps will continue to work. Meanwhile, the HTML-based Edge Legacy will be succeeded by the new Chromium-based Edge, the company's new flagship offering. Edge Chromium offers a number of security, productivity, and quality of life updates that should bring the experience in line with what users can expect from a modern web browser. "At a time when IT professionals must do more with less at an unprecedented level, we want to make it easier for our customers to balance productivity, security, privacy and cost," Microsoft said. "The new Microsoft Edge is our best expression of a modern browser, and we're excited customers are experiencing it."