IE support by Windows and important services
This post describes the current (2022 May) support status of IE (Internet Explorer) for Windows, and other important services.
“The Internet Explorer (IE) 11 desktop application will end support for Windows 10 semi-annual channel starting June 15, 2022.”
Regarding Microsoft Edge with IE mode: “IE mode enables backward compatibility and will be supported through at least 2029”
https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/lifecycle/products/internet-explorer-11
Edge is installed by default from Windows 10, and IE is not even available in Windows 11.
Older versions of Windows can install Edge, and this differs on whether installing the newer Chromium builds or the older non-Chromium Edge builds.
Further information can be found here: https://www.intowindows.com/how-do-i-install-microsoft-edge-on-windows-7-or-windows-88-1/
It looks like, as of some time at the end of 2020, IE has stopped working for many popular websites.
I can only assume that requires that Edge is installed so that would mean this wouldn’t be an issue on older versions of Windows (Windows 8 and less if Edge is not installed.), but I do not have an older version of Windows to check with.
“Microsoft will forcibly open some websites in Edge instead of Internet Explorer”: https://www.zdnet.com/article/microsoft-will-forcibly-open-some-websites-in-edge-instead-of-internet-explorer/
The article shares a list of websites that require Edge: https://edge.microsoft.com/neededge/v1
I am not sure if this is the latest list or if it gets updated, so please look into it further if required.
Trying to load YouTube.com which is on the list, in IE11 on Windows 10 automatically loaded in Edge for me, so the above seems to be accurate.
Due to the above, it is actually very difficult to test for IE11 support because if you have Edge installed, most sites will redirect to Edge.
Looking at western sites from Alexa(https://www.alexa.com/topsites) and other ranking services, and ignoring any likely duplicates, I checked the following popular websites for IE support where clear info is provided:
Google.com:
From a post on Twitter on 2nd October 2021, it can be assumed that support for IE11 ended around the same time as the post for Google Search.
https://9to5google.com/2021/10/01/google-search-internet-explorer-11/
https://twitter.com/cramforce/status/1443962459723755533
YouTube.com:
“YouTube no longer supports Internet Explorer.”: https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/175292?hl=en
“Starting in March, YouTube will cease their support of Microsoft’s Internet Explorer web browser.” posted on Feb 27, 2020, so I assume this means YouTube ended support during March 2020: https://maplestory.nexon.net/news/56484/youtube-ending-support-for-internet-explorer
twitter.com:
Twitter does not support IE, and it looks like unsupported user agents are blocked:
https://help.twitter.com/en/using-twitter/twitter-supported-browsers
yahoo.com:
Yahoo seems to have been unsupported for a while, with many reporting an unsupported message: “You’re seeing Basic Mail because you’re using an unsupported Internet browser. Upgrade your browser for the full Yahoo experience.”
This does not mean it does not work at all.
A Japanese blog entry states that IE11 is not recommended for “Yahoo! JAPAN” starting from 7th September 2021: https://techblog.yahoo.co.jp/entry/2022021630265506/
Amazon.com:
Internet Explorer support ended by Amazon: https://tamebay.com/2021/01/internet-explorer-support-ended-by-amazon
※ E-commerce sites such as Amazon choosing to miss out on potential sales by removing support for IE shows just how dead IE is.
GitHub.com:
GitHub does not support IE: https://docs.github.com/en/get-started/using-github/supported-browsers
From this Tweet, it can be seen that GitHub stopped supporting Internet Explorer in July 2018: https://twitter.com/michlbrmly/status/981855020948877312
netflix.com:
Although IE does not seem to be a supported browser: https://help.netflix.com/en/node/30081
It does appear for the Silverlight plug-in here: https://help.netflix.com/en/node/23742
At the time of writing this article, support seems to exist for IE11 to IE7 for Silverlight 5.