Starting Internet Explorer Mode on Windows 11

As an employee of a company or consumer of a service, you may have to deal with web apps that only work within Internet Explorer. If so, it’s good to know that Microsoft Edge and Windows 11 offer a special Internet Explorer mode.

The Internet Explorer browser has since been retired. On Windows 10 you can still access that browser, but on Windows 11 it’s a lot more difficult. So you need the aforementioned Edge browser mode for that. Activating the mode will not be known to everyone, so in this article we explain exactly how you can do that.

Internet Explorer mode within Edge

Of course you need Windows 11 and the Microsoft Edge browser for this. Open Edge and go to the settings (the three dots at the top right). Press Settings; you’ll find that button near the bottom. On the left in the menu you will find the option Default browser† You hardly expect it, but this is the place where you activate the Internet Explorer mode.

On this page you see very big Internet Explorer Compatibility to stand. Below that is the option Let Internet Explorer open sites in Microsoft Edge† The default option is Only incompatible sites† Click on the drop-down menu on the right and select the option Always (recommended)†

Then there is one more important option that we should take a look at, and that is the second function. You want to allow sites to be reloaded in Internet Explorer mode. Click again on the menu on the right and select the option Allow† This setting allows sites to be reloaded in Internet Explorer mode if a site requires browser for compatibility.

To save the settings, you need to restart the Edge browser. Remember that when you edit something here, you not makes Microsoft Edge or Internet Explorer suddenly your default browsers. What you adjust here is that websites optimized for Internet Explorer open in Internet Explorer mode.

After modifying and opening a website that requires Internet Explorer to work properly, you will see a special icon in the taskbar. You may recognize that logo; that is the old Explorer logo. A notification will also appear, asking if you always want to use this website in mode.

If you still want to make Edge your default browser, open the same settings again and press the button on the top of the page Set as Default†

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