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Microsoft Edge Browser Review: It's Chrome, But With Ads
Microsoft has just released the Edge browser to the public - and we gave it an extensive trial run. Overall, the browser is basically everything you would expect from a modern web experience but with ads built into it. Microsoft Edge is a big step up from the old Internet Explorer, but it feels more like an effort to fit in as opposed to a truly unique or revolutionary experience. The addition of ads built right into the browser, however, puts Microsoft Edge into a league of its own in terms of nasty practices.
Microsoft Edge is based on the same technology that powers Google Chrome called Chromium. There are a number of other Chromium browsers out there already today such as Brave. This means that if you’ve ever used Chrome or a Chromium browser, Microsoft Edge will seem very familiar. The advantage of being Chromium-based is that a plethora of add-ons and extensions will work immediately out of the box. We tried a few of our favorites and found that they all performed seamlessly.
When it comes to performance and loading speed, Microsoft Edge performed similarly to both Google Chrome and Brave. The software feels snappy and responsive, and overall provides a solid browsing experience that is completely in line with other Chromium browsers.
Microsoft, Why Did You Put Ads In Edge?
Microsoft is notorious for sneaking ads into their software. Recently, Microsoft was caught putting ads into various built in Windows 10 apps. That means if you paid for Windows 10, you are essentially paying for ads. Microsoft Edge, on the other hand, is free software that anyone can download. It even works on Macs. However, all mainstream browsers do not have built in ads.
The ads appear when selecting the informative start up tab style. That means when you create a new tab, you can choose to see a richer page that includes things like recent news articles, stock prices, and sports scores. We were impressed to see that the news articles it shared gave preference to non-biased sources like the Associated Press. However, on the first page of our fresh installation, the site did recommend articles from Vox, the Washington Post, and Fox News – all are allegedly biased news sources according to third-party bias checkers like mediabiasfactcheck.com.
Once you scroll past a few news articles, ads will begin to appear. We saw ads for DNA testing companies, credit cards aggregators, pet sites, and the list went on and on the further we scrolled. It’s important to note, however, that the informative tab style is not on by default and you can easily disable it. However, it stands to reason that at least some people will choose this arrangement, and will then be bombarded with ads that are undoubtedly designed to line the pockets of Microsoft executives. In our opinion, this was a mistake and something that Microsoft should consider correcting if they want their browser to be taken seriously.
In conclusion, Microsoft Edge is a fully functional browser thanks to it’s Chromium roots. However, because it is so similar to practically all other modern browser choices, there is really no compelling reason to switch. Most likely you already have a favorite browser, and Microsoft Edge isn’t likely to provide you with anything that would justify moving away from your comfort zone. The only major difference we saw was the new startup tab options, but those come prepackaged with ads, making them a poor choice for those that want a speedy and clean browsing experience. Sorry Microsoft, you’re going to have to try harder. Copying Google Chrome and adding ads just isn’t enough.
