Microsoft will uninstall legacy Edge in April 2021 and replace it with Chromium Edge

[harlan4096]

Microsoft revealed its plans in regards to the legacy version of the Microsoft Edge web browser recently. The legacy version will receive security updates until March 2021, and then run out of support.

What Microsoft did not reveal back when it made the initial announcement was what would happen to the browser afterwards. Could users continue using it, at their own risk, or would it be removed?

A new article on Microsoft's Tech Community website provides the answer to the question. Microsoft will push the new Chromium-based Microsoft Edge web browser to devices that still have the legacy Edge browser installed and not the new one, on April 13, 2021.

In other words: Microsoft Edge legacy will be removed from systems on which the April 2021 security updates are installed on.
 

When you apply this update to your devices, the out of support Microsoft Edge Legacy desktop application will be removed and the new Microsoft Edge will be installed.

The optional second update in March, the "C" release of the month, will do the same thing.

Not all versions of Windows are affected by the change. Since Microsoft Edge legacy was never released by Microsoft for Windows 7 and Windows 8.1, these two systems won't be impacted by the change.

For Windows 10, all versions of the operating system starting with Windows 10 version 1803 will have legacy Edge removed and replaced with the Chromium-based Microsoft Edge browser.

Windows 10 version 20H2 is a special case as the new Microsoft Edge is already the default browser on the system. Legacy Edge will still be removed from the system when the April 2021 updates are installed.

The Chromium-based version of Microsoft Edge is only installed if it is not available already on the system. If that is the case, if it is already installed, only Edge legacy will be uninstalled as part of the April 2021 update.

Microsoft notes that defaults and personalization will be respected, and that includes that legacy Edge shortcuts are replaced with shortcuts pointing to the new Edge browser.

EdgeHTML, the rendering engine used by the legacy version of Microsoft Edge, will remain on the system as other components may still require it.

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