Microsoft has announced the retirement of Internet Explorer, its veteran browser that dominated the world for many years. Launched in 1995, Internet Explorer was the main browser used on the planet until the end of the 2000s.
In a blog post, Microsoft announced the retirement dates for the browser, which has been a Microsoft staple since its arrival in the 90s, when it toppled Netscape Navigator from its position as the leading browser of its time. The browsers that became its competitors were slow to arrive. Mozilla's Firefox was only released in 2004, while the Google Chrome browser was only released in 2008.
Microsoft has confirmed that as of November 30, 2020, Microsoft Teams will no longer support Internet Explorer. So on March 9, 2021, Microsoft Edge Legacy will come to an end (Edge Legacy is the Edge HTML browser which is currently the default browser in Windows 10).
For Internet Explorer 11, the real end of its 26-year odyssey will arrive on August 17, 2021, when Microsoft 365 apps and services will no longer be supported.
"This means that after the above dates, customers will have a degraded experience or will not be able to connect to Microsoft 365 apps and services in IE 11," Microsoft wrote. "For degraded experiences, new Microsoft 365 features will not be available or certain features may stop working when accessing the app or service via IE 11."
"While we know this change will be difficult for some customers, we believe customers will get the most out of Microsoft 365 when using the new Microsoft Edge," he added. "We are committed to helping make this transition as smooth as possible."
Internet Explorer 11 (IE11) was released in 2013, but a lot has changed in the last seven years, with the online world becoming increasingly sophisticated and the arrival of open web standards (HTML5 etc).
But Microsoft wanted users to know that Internet Explorer isn't going away entirely, as 2,76% - according to the Stat Counter - still use the old browser.
"We understand the need to 'do more with less' in the new business environment," said Redmond. "On the dates listed above, customers should no longer access Microsoft 365 apps and services using IE 11, but we want to make it clear that IE 11 is not going away and that our customers' own legacy IE 11 apps and investments will continue." at work."
Internet Explorer's retirement has been planned since late 2015, when Microsoft began warning customers that support for older versions of Internet Explorer would be phased out. In January 2016, Microsoft officially stopped supporting Internet Explorer 8, 9, and 10.
