Microsoft announced Monday it is officially saying goodbye to its web browser Internet Explorer 11 in 2021.
“Today, we’re announcing that Microsoft 365 apps and services will no longer support Internet Explorer 11 (IE 11) by this time next year. Beginning November 30, 2020, the Microsoft Teams web app will no longer support IE 11. Beginning August 17, 2021, the remaining Microsoft 365 apps and services will no longer support IE 11,” Microsoft announced on its website.
“This means that after the above dates, customers will have a degraded experience or will be unable to connect to Microsoft 365 apps and services on IE 11. For degraded experiences, new Microsoft 365 features will not be available, or certain features may cease to work when accessing the app or service via IE 11. While we know this change will be difficult for some customers, we believe that customers will get the most out of Microsoft 365 when using the new Microsoft Edge. We are committed to helping make this transition as smooth as possible,” it added.
“Customers have been using IE 11 since 2013 when the online environment was much less sophisticated than the landscape today. Since then, open web standards and newer browsers—like the new Microsoft Edge—have enabled better, more innovative online experiences. We believe that Microsoft 365 subscribers, in both consumer and commercial contexts, will be well served with this change through faster and more responsive web access to greater sets of features in everyday toolsets like Outlook, Teams, SharePoint, and more,” it further said.
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No more Internet Explorer 11 in 2021- Microsoft
Microsoft said they would also be dropping its support for the existing Legacy version of Microsoft Edge on March 9, 2021.
Internet Explorer is a series of graphical web browsers developed by Microsoft and included in the Microsoft Windows line of operating systems, starting in 1995. It was first released as part of the add-on package Plus! for Windows 95 that year.
Later versions were available as free downloads, or in-service packs, and included in the original equipment manufacturer (OEM) service releases of Windows 95 and later versions of Windows.
Internet Explorer was once the most widely used web browser, attaining a peak of about 95% usage share by 2003.
Its usage share has since declined with the launch of Firefox (2004) and Google Chrome (2008), and with the growing popularity of operating systems such as Android and iOS that do not support Internet Explorer.