Announcing an updated version of Internet Explorer 11 - available on Windows 8.1, Windows 7, and Windows Phone 8.1
Today we’re excited to announce an updated version of Internet Explorer 11 available with the Windows 8.1 Update and for our Windows 7 customers as well as the debut of Internet Explorer 11 for Windows Phone 8.1. The Windows 8.1 Update will be available for download today on MSDN and TechNet, with automatic updates beginning April 8th for both Windows 7 and Windows 8.1 customers. We are also launching two new experiences today – 22Tracks and FishGL – so you can explore what’s new with IE11 across Windows and Windows Phone.
We've heard that people browse the Web on many devices, switching between their laptop, tablet, and phone throughout the day. Today’s update to IE11 means that whatever device you pick-up, your tabs and favorites are there for you, right where you left off. Windows 8.1 and Windows Phone 8.1 share the same experience and underlying Web standards that help developers build interoperable sites and apps that just work across many browsers and devices. That includes updates to the latest specs for hardware-accelerated (and stable) WebGL as well as professional quality rich media like HTML5 video including closed captioning, adaptive streaming, and rights management.
Internet Explorer 11 works seamlessly across phone, laptop, and small and large tablets
Introducing IE11 for Windows Phone 8.1
With Windows Phone 8.1 you now have access to the most modern and full-featured phone browser ever with IE11. In addition to the same underlying engine across device experiences, and roaming your favorites and tabs between devices, Windows Phone now offers many of the same features as the modern IE you experience on Windows. With IE11 for Windows Phone and Live Sites you can now pin your favorite sites directly to your Start Screen for information from the Web at a glance. Reading Mode helps you optimize the view of articles like you were reading a digital book on your phone. Voice Commands get you quickly to your favorite Web sites by speaking naturally to your device. IE11 for Windows Phone also includes InPrivate to keep your browsing private. And to help you better manage your phone’s data usage, the new High Savings Mode can be enabled to reduce data consumption by 60-80% through reducing image downloads and only loading elements of the page relevant to the content you want to view.
Updated IE11 for Windows 8.1
With today’s update, IE11 adapts your browsing experience by detecting your Windows device and input type – whether an 8 inch tablet in portrait mode or a 24 inch desktop with mouse and keyboard. The Web is still front-and-center but new design enhancements make your browsing experience feel like it was made just for your device – like the number of tabs on-screen and the size of the fonts and menus. You can also now control when the browser remains on-screen or hides away for full-screen browsing depending on the type of device you use.
Internet Explorer 11 adjusts responsively, adapting to your device
New enhancements to the F12 Developer Tools
IE11 comes with a completely redesigned and enhanced suite of in-browser developer tools that help developers build, diagnose, and optimize modern Web sites and apps. We heard from developers – you want shortcuts that are more common across the many tools you use and more flexibility to emulate various versions of IE. Today’s update includes enhancements to both of those requests as well as improved UI and Memory tools. The Debugger tools make it easier to identify, detect, and isolate code that is transcompiled, minified, or part of 3rd party libraries like jQuery.
A complete set of enhancements is available on MSDN here.
Enterprise Mode helps organizations progress toward modern browsers
Available for both Windows 8.1 and Windows 7, Enterprise Mode for Internet Explorer 11 provides improved Internet Explorer 8 compatibility for specified sites. Enabling enterprises to safely update to Internet Explorer 11 while maintaining great backwards compatibility for specific sites that were developed for Internet Explorer 8 or below. Organizations can designate that Enterprise Mode be enabled for specific sites so they can benefit from modern Web standards, better performance, and increased security of a modern Web browser, while reducing upgrade costs and extending legacy Web app investments. By improving backward compatibility for older versions of Internet Explorer, this also helps organization stay up-to-date with services such as Office 365 and deploy devices like the Surface Pro 2.
For IT professionals, you can learn more about the benefits of Enterprise Mode for Internet Explorer 11 from the IE engineering blog and the Internet Explorer TechNet page.
22tracks and FishGL: Fast, beautiful, and perfect for touch
In January, we invited developers and enthusiasts alike to help us rethink what’s possible on the Web. With today’s updates to IE11, we take another step toward that vision by releasing two new experiences. We remain committed to building an open and interoperable Web – while these experiences are perfect for touch-browsing, they work well in any modern browser.
22tracks: https://t.22tracks.com
We’ve teamed-up with the team at 22tracks to bring you a completely new touch-first music experience. 22tracks is all about finding new, emerging music – featuring top DJs from across Europe: Amsterdam, London, Paris, Brussels, and they are expanding. The site shows that with a single line of code, developers can create responsive sites that look great across many screen sizes, by automatically detecting the device you’re using and adjusting the experience accordingly. And with the power of WebGL, an interactive audio visualizer adapts to your music and responds to your touch – tap and hold, swipe, and drag as your listen and see what happens. The site also takes advantage of many features in Windows that make it feel like an app: you can pin your favorite tracks to the Windows Start Screen, share tracks using the Charm Bar, or save and listen to a track later using the Reading List app in Windows. A few more details about the folks at 22Tracks and their site are available on their blog.
22tracks helps you find emerging music...across any device
FishGL: https://fishGL.com
WebGL and the 3D JavaScript library three.JS bring the browser to life in a way that no other technology can. And since Internet Explorer has a fun history with fish aquariums, we felt this update shouldn’t be any different. Enter FishGL – an interactive, touch-friendly 3D graphics benchmark. Rotate around the tank of colorful fish. Crank up the fish count, see how many your browser can run. While you are there tap the glass to scatter the fish or tap and hold for more one-on-one interaction. Swipe your finger across the screen to rotate the room or pinch to zoom. Use the control panel to toggle to fish view – insider the aquarium. Power users can adjust the aquarium physics too.
Can you find the light switch to the aquarium?
Looking Ahead
While we are excited about today's announcement we're even more excited about the future. As we begin working on the next generation of Internet Explorer for all of our devices we want to build a deeper partnership with users and Web developers. We want to hear more from you and starting today we are launching a beta site to help foster a two-way dialog between the IE team at Microsoft and the community. At status.modern.IE you can see what is supported in IE and standards we are evaluating for future versions. We’ll be listening to your feedback, via @IEDevChat, conferences and online forums, and we want to hear even more from the community about what you want to see in the next versions of IE.
status.modern.IE (beta) – At a glance information on what’s available in IE and across browsers, and what’s coming next!
Be sure to download today’s Windows update via MSDN or TechNet for the very latest, install the Windows Phone 8.1 update to start using IE11 today on your Phone and check-out our new experiences: 22Tracks and FishGL. On April 8 the Windows 8.1 update and IE11 update for Windows 7 will be available for all customers via Windows Update.
We look forward to hearing your feedback @IEDevChat or via Connect, to help us move the industry forward and continue to enhance the browser.
— Sam George, Partner Group Program Manager, Internet Explorer
Comments
Anonymous
April 02, 2014
The comment has been removedAnonymous
April 02, 2014
Also, does this update helps hardware acceleration in webgl? The fishgl demo runs at 6fps right now using maximum 100% cpu utilization but 0% gpu utilization. Chrome and FF both run it at 60fps.Anonymous
April 02, 2014
The comment has been removedAnonymous
April 02, 2014
The comment has been removedAnonymous
April 02, 2014
any news on the getUserMedia support that was "announced" almost 2 years ago that hasn't been seen?Anonymous
April 02, 2014
Can I download this yet? Is there a release date?Anonymous
April 02, 2014
These enhancement are good but I would think 256bit encryption would be a priority for securing their browser.Anonymous
April 02, 2014
Will the Xbox One get the update too?Anonymous
April 03, 2014
Adaptive streaming that is what I have been waiting for. What does the stream provider need to run on their server for that to work?Anonymous
April 03, 2014
Since upgrading to IE 11, I have experienced numerous lockup. Have to bring up task manager which shows usage at or around 34%. End the task and restart IE works for a while. Usually within a few minutes IE will hang again and/or I will get an error message telling me that IE is not working and to end/restart. As far as speed is concerned, it is faster than IE 8 which I run on XP, but overall it is not noticeable faster than IE 9 and 10, I run on Windows 7 and Windows 8.1. I also have formatting problems depending on the web site I am on. I tried flagging these web sites to run in compatibility mode which seems to address part of the formatting issues.Anonymous
April 03, 2014
In internet explorer I notice problems not able to select copy , edit or even pasting websites when sending emails . Wonder if anyone is aware of thisAnonymous
April 03, 2014
Any chance we get cloud backup for Windows 7 too?Anonymous
April 03, 2014
Does any one found the actual link for download as of 3.04.2014?Anonymous
April 03, 2014
All these is nice. thanks. But, really I can't see how IE could be a real Chrome competitor with so Little efforts.Anonymous
April 03, 2014
Although the article says it's available on MSDN, it sure doesn't appear to be.Anonymous
April 04, 2014
Great to see IE improve, through I wonder, is IE11 also coming to Xbox? 10 is great, but it would be lovely if we could have IE11 on it. Looking forward to the 8th!Anonymous
April 04, 2014
Will Windows Store apps developed using HTML5 and powered by IE11 be able to restrict downloads to users who have this updated version of IE? I believe it includes many new WebGL features and performance fixes that would allow development of apps that were not possible in the previous IE11 (11.0.4 or below). If we cannot restrict by IE version this poses conflict as many users may download the app and be unable to run it.Anonymous
April 04, 2014
Can IE 11 on WP 8.1 support backward and forward with hand gestures?Anonymous
April 04, 2014
@iinnnnit - In the SDK, it does so. :) @Tyler - they are, they just don't support stuff that isn't part of the standard of is still in the possibility to change, and that's a very good thing.Anonymous
April 05, 2014
I'm not too impressed. Running Windows 8.1 Update and on my Dell Latitude E6510 with NVIDIA GPU, the FishGL does not perform: IE 11: 2 fps Firefox 28: 13 fps Chrome 33: 22 fps 22tracks crashes my IE 11 almost instantly. What do you mean with "New enhancements to the F12 Developer Tools".. are there any enhancements in the updated version of IE 11? I didn't see any. I've also tested Enterprise Mode, but I didn't see any benefit when using it on our SharePoint 2010 portal. In a Picture Library, "Open with Windows Explorer" and "Upload multiple pictures" options do not appear when using IE11, even in Enterprise Mode. In IE8, IE9 and IE10 it works fine!Anonymous
April 08, 2014
Well, installed the update, Fishtank demo still runs at 6fps and uses cpu-only instead of videocard. On other browsers is actually uses the gpu and runs 60fps no matter the amount of fishes. This is very disappointing, since the greatest strength of IE since version 9 has been the hardware acceleration, which is many times faster than in any other browser. Win7 x64, Intel 3570k, Radeon 6970. I like the minor improvements in the developer tools, they look pretty useful. I hope the lockup issue has been fixed, time will tell.Anonymous
April 08, 2014
@Gerard It looks like the KB article at support.microsoft.com/.../2929437 has details on what changed in the F12 Dev tools.Anonymous
April 08, 2014
Hi! When will IE support HTML5 the different input types like <input type="datetime" /> (color, week, ...)? Henk.Anonymous
April 09, 2014
Browsers test result: Maxthon 4.3.2.1000: 60FPS Chrome 34.0.1847.116m: 75 FPS Opera 20.0.1387.91: 75FPS Firefox 28.0: 66 FPS IE 11.0.4 (Before Win 8.1 Update 1) : 2 FPS IE 11.0.7 (After Win 8.1 Update 1) : 2 FPS! (Yes 2 FPS) Why 2 FPS?
My Hardware Profile: CPU: Intel Core 2 Duo E8200 2.66GHz Chipset: Intel P35 RAM: 4GB DDR2 800MHz Graphic: Nvidia GeForce 240GT 1GB VRAM GDDR5 + Latest official driver OS: Windows 8.1 Update 1 + All Other Updates since first release to now
Anonymous
April 09, 2014
Just update to Windows 8.1 update 1. Have one question regard IE. How to hide the tab and address bar at the bottom of screen in Modern IE mode?Anonymous
April 10, 2014
thanks for status.modern.IEAnonymous
April 11, 2014
Running 64 bit Windows 7, I tried installing IE 11 when it first came out (billed as the correct IE for 64 bit Windows 7). It wouldn't install. Spend money to call Windows Help; they couldn't install IE11 either, and said there were some problems that caused installation failure on some machines. They recommended waiting until a service update for Windows 11 was released. Does anyone know if this is that service update, or if a service update has been released? I don't see anything about a SP1 version of Windows 11.Anonymous
April 12, 2014
I'm a computer repair tech here in Albuquerque, NM & IE 11 is locking up on several of the models I've just installed it on (after updates), but not all...not sure why. Please fix the problem where it can't connect online to any site using Win 11 & on several different laptop models....thanks.Anonymous
April 12, 2014
PS- It always happens at the very tail end of me completing a full Windows update, that I've noticed anyways. (meaning I install until there are no more left)Anonymous
April 12, 2014
PPS- I easily get around this problem by simply uninstalling IE 11 (until you fix it) & letting the IE browser roll it's self back to the old IE 10 version he had before, reboot, then everything works just fine again. I hide the update so the customer doesn't accidentally download it and say "WFT!", lol~: )~* heheheAnonymous
April 12, 2014
Firefox (the only other browser I ever bother to install, lol!) worked just fine at the time I was experience IE 11 online connectivity failure. Thought you might like to know that too. Hope it helps you solve the issue by narrowing down the problem. If I discover anything else, I'll let you know ASAP. Good Luck GuysAnonymous
April 12, 2014
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April 12, 2014
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April 13, 2014
Feature Suggestion In Modern IE Always show tab bar features is lacking in Modern IE. Modern IE feature suggestions combine favorite bar and tab bar together make it act like a windows 8 taskbar. Basically I want is ability to pin website in tab bar and when clicking the icon the button would appear just like how the taskbar works. When user right click or drag up the tab button would show the Jumplist. Ability to drag the favorite icon on the tab bar will make things easer.Anonymous
April 13, 2014
The comment has been removedAnonymous
April 14, 2014
Just got the phone version on 8.1... it tends to break form posts, doing a GET when it should be a post. It also won't display certain pages with ambiguous MIME types, prompting to save or open them instead of just displaying them. It borders on being not usable.