Hands-On Windows 152: Microsoft Edge Pt. 3

Summary

Podcast Summary: Hands-On Windows 152: Microsoft Edge Pt. 3

Podcast Information:

• Title: All TWiT.tv Shows (Audio)
• Host: TWiT (Leo Laporte)
• Episode: Hands-On Windows 152: Microsoft Edge Pt. 3
• Release Date: August 7, 2025

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Introduction

In the latest episode of Hands-On Windows, host Paul Thurott delves deep into the intricacies of Microsoft Edge on Windows 11. Aimed at users who prefer alternative browsers like Google Chrome or Brave, Paul addresses common frustrations and provides actionable solutions to optimize their Windows experience without relying on Edge.

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Persistent Presence of Microsoft Edge

Paul begins by highlighting the challenges users face with Microsoft Edge's persistent background activity and intrusive prompts to switch back to it.

Paul Thurott [04:50]: "Edge is still running in the background, and it's going to pop up regardless of which browser you set as default."

He explains that even after setting a different default browser, Edge can still interfere through features like search highlights and the widgets interface, which may default to Bing searches.

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Configuring a Different Default Browser

A significant portion of the discussion focuses on properly setting an alternative browser as the default. Paul guides listeners through the Windows Settings to ensure comprehensive configuration.

Paul Thurott [04:15]: "Go to Apps, then Default Apps in the Settings app. Scroll down to your preferred browser and set it as default for all relevant protocols and file types, such as web links and PDFs."

However, he notes that merely setting a different default browser might not suffice due to Edge's lingering processes.

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Utilizing Third-Party Utilities

To combat Edge's stubborn presence, Paul introduces a third-party utility called Ms. Edge Direct, which intercepts system-level calls that would otherwise default to Edge.

Paul Thurott [06:05]: "Ms. Edge Direct is a free, open-source tool that redirects system calls from Edge to your chosen browser, ensuring a cleaner experience."

He emphasizes the importance of such tools in maintaining control over the browser environment, especially when default settings fall short.

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Managing Startup Processes

Addressing the issue of Edge running in the background, Paul advises users to disable Edge's startup processes:

Paul Thurott [07:40]: "Navigate to the Startup section in the Settings or use Task Manager to disable Edge from running automatically when your computer boots up."

Additionally, he recommends disabling the Startup Boost feature, which preloads websites based on user behavior, thereby reducing system resources and preventing unwanted Edge activity.

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Advanced System Configurations

For users seeking a more thorough removal, Paul discusses the implications of uninstalling Edge altogether—a feature typically restricted outside Europe but achievable with specific utilities like WindToys.

Paul Thurott [09:20]: "With WindToys, you can uninstall Edge, granting you complete freedom from its integration into the Windows ecosystem."

He cautions, however, that maintaining an alternative browser alongside Edge can be beneficial for backup purposes or managing multiple sign-ins for services like PayPal.

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Enhancing Privacy and Security

Paul doesn't stop at browser configuration; he also touches on enhancing privacy across all browsers to prevent tracking. He highly recommends installing extensions such as Privacy Badger and AdBlock Plus.

Paul Thurott [10:55]: "Regardless of your browser choice, ensure you have robust privacy extensions to safeguard your online activities from unwanted tracking and ads."

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Conclusion and Final Thoughts

Wrapping up the episode, Paul reiterates that while completely eliminating Edge from Windows 11 requires several steps and sometimes third-party tools, the effort results in a more personalized and efficient browsing experience. He acknowledges that Microsoft continuously tweaks its approach, which might occasionally prompt Edge's reappearance, but with the configurations discussed, users can maintain a relatively Edge-free environment.

Paul Thurott [12:30]: "Microsoft moves the goalposts from time to time, but with the right setup, you can enjoy a seamless Windows experience without Edge dictating your browsing habits."

Paul concludes by encouraging listeners to experiment with the settings and utilities mentioned, promising that persistence will lead to a cleaner, more controlled system setup.

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Key Takeaways:

• Default Browser Configuration: Properly set your preferred browser as default through Windows Settings.
• Third-Party Utilities: Use tools like Ms. Edge Direct and WindToys to intercept or remove Edge's system-level activities.
• Manage Startup Processes: Disable Edge from running at startup and turn off Startup Boost to prevent background activity.
• Enhance Privacy: Install privacy-focused extensions such as Privacy Badger and AdBlock Plus across all browsers.
• Stay Updated: Be prepared for occasional prompts from Microsoft and adjust settings as needed to maintain your preferred setup.

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This episode provides a comprehensive guide for Windows 11 users seeking to minimize or eliminate Microsoft Edge's dominance, offering practical solutions and expert insights to tailor the browsing experience to individual preferences.

Transcript

[Paul Thurott]

Coming up next on Hands on Windows, I heard your complaints. This week we're going to teach you how not to use Microsoft Edge and how to best configure Windows 11 for that scenario.

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[Paul Thurott]

Podcasts you love from people you trust. This is Twitter. Hello, everybody, and welcome back to Hands on Windows. Paul Thurat. And this week we're going to look at Microsoft Edge again, except from a different perspective. I've been using Edge a lot lately, but I know a lot of people don't. Most people don't. And that's fine, right? Most people will run Edge one time, use it to install Google Chrome probably, and then never think about it again. And that's okay, except for a couple of things. One, Edge is still running in the background, and two, it's going to pop up regardless, right? There are going to be certain things that you do. For example, search highlights when you go off the search button. That's not the search button. When you start searching here, you'll get search results from in Bing in this case are going to launch in Microsoft Edge. And I just closed it there. But the widgets interface, same thing. If you find a store in here you like somehow, which is not. I'm not saying it's impossible, but it's mostly impossible. That thing will also run in Edge even if you've configured Chrome or whatever other browser as the default. So there are. And then there's also just harassment, right? Every once in a while, Microsoft will pop up and say, hey, we notice you're not using Edge. Use dry Edge. Edge is a great browser. How come you're not using Edge? And so there are some things you can do. It's never going to be 100% perfect. Microsoft also kind of moves the goal line a little bit from time to time. But sitting here in roughly mid-2025, these are the things you should do if you're going to use Windows 11, but you're definitely not going to be using Microsoft Edge. Okay, so the first is to configure a different browser as your default browser. That sounds pretty obvious. But if you run a browser like this is Brave here, it will come up with this thing. I could click that, but instead I'm going to show you the other way because you might not see that little button because it's not always there. If you go to Apps and then default apps and the Settings app in Windows and then you have to scroll down. I'll wait for this thing to catch up. Find the browser that you want to use. So I'll go to Edge Brave again, sorry, this interface has changed a little bit. Right. They've added these links up here, which is kind of fun. But you can make this the default. And this is new. In fact, this is technically only available in the eu. I'm going to explain that one in a little while. But there's also this button. But what you would typically do is just go down to here and say, okay, I'm going to use Brave for all of the typical web links, but also for PDFs, right? So if I double click on the PDF, it's going to open that. Now you can see it's not everything. And I'm actually getting a fairly ideal view of this. If you're in the United States, if you're anywhere other than Europe, there's actually usually fewer things clicked or selected there for you. We'll get to that in a minute. But you might want to go through this list and just make sure everything's.

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[Paul Thurott]

Okay, so that's good, but like I said, Edge is still going to run. Right. So let me. I'll bring up terrible widgets interface. We'll give this thing a little test. Slowly it moves. Okay. Close encounter with a great way to check. Fantastic. So when you click that. Oh, so I've already. I'm sorry, I've already made this change in the background. So that loaded in Brave, which is what I want, but that's not typically the way the system works. Right. And the reason is I'm using a third party utility called Ms. Edge Direct, which you can Google or bang and download. It's free, it's also open source, so it's running in the background. So what this is doing is intercepting the system level calls that would normally have it go and use Edge. Even when you said you wanted to use Brave or Chrome or whatever browsers. That's extremely useful. I think it is. Let's see, Edge, what is it called? Direct. Because this can't work properly because everything is terrible. This is the app here and there's a couple of interfaces and a couple of different ways that you can run this thing. But the, the one that you want is the one that I have enabled Active mode. And it just means it's going to run at startup. It's going to run in the background and it's just going to sit there and intercept. Right. All of those things. So that's, that's good. But Edge is still running in the background. Right. And so actually I was going to close this, but I need this. So if you go to Apps again in the Settings app and then Startup, you could also use Task Manager. If you're a little more old school, you get a very similar interface in this app here, right? Yep. And this is. But a little harder to see, so I'll use this one. This is going to show you all of the apps that are running automatically when the computer boots or when you sign into Windows. Right. So you can sort it so that the ones that are running so we get a Brave update are running. That's fantastic. Discord is like a piece of malware that runs even when you tell it not to. That's fine. But you can see Microsoft Edges here. So if I'm going to use Brave, turn this off. Right. And you think, well, okay, that's great, I've done this, but not exactly. So Edge, you know, again, unless you've done that third party utility I mentioned earlier, still going to run sometimes. And Edge is in fact running right here. So let me bring this up. And it's already freaking out because it's not the default. That's okay, it'll be okay. But you also want to go into system and performance, probably. System. Yeah, Startup Boost. This, what this does is it preloads sites based on what you've done in the past, maybe what you bookmarks, you have in the new tab screen, etc. Etc. There's also options in here. If you have web apps that you may be installed with Microsoft Edge, you actually would want to leave that running, but I would disable this in this case. So Startup Boost and then taking it out of the startup apps, those are the two main ones that you should do. You're not going to use Edge. Don't, don't let it run in the background. The other thing you could do is something that we talked about, it was a couple of episodes ago, maybe five, six episodes ago, which is use that WindToys utility. Right. And that, that might be why. That is why I should say why we saw those extra features in the default Apps interface. Right. And so when you go into the system interface here, there's a bunch of stuff here, but one of them is this digital markets app thing. And so this gets reset from time to time. But I did enable this and I think this is why I saw what happened. It's telling me I need to reboot here, but enable this, reboot your computer and then you'll have the experience that you could have as a European if even if you live somewhere else. And that means there's additional capabilities that are not made to the available to the rest of the world that Microsoft does in Europe because they want to comply with the Digital Markets act regulations. Right. So that interface that I showed earlier is one of them. Let's go back again so you can see that again because that's not something wrong. One, not typically something you see in the United States where I. Well, actually I'm in Mexico, but you don't typically see it anywhere other than Europe. But these choices and then this button here, these are all things that are just available typically in Europe. So because I'm running wintoys, because I enabled that feature earlier, that's why I was seeing that. But that's not the only thing. You could also, this is a little extreme, but now you get an uninstall option on Edge, which is also something we don't get in the United States or in the rest of the world. Right. I, I'm not 100% sure I recommend uninstalling it mostly because it's actually a pretty good idea to have another browser on your computer, even if you're just going to use Chrome or whatever it is all the time, just as a backup. Just as sometimes you want to maybe have two sign ins to the same service, like a Google service, maybe use one for one and one for the other or whatever. There are different scenarios where this actually makes sense. I do this in part because of PayPal. For example, I have two PayPal accounts, so I can sign into one on one system and the other on the other. But, but if you're, you know, if you want to be radical about it, you could uninstall Edge. You can uninstall other things because of that Digital Market act compliance. Like I think the Microsoft Store is one of those things where you couldn't typically do that in the United States or elsewhere. But thanks to that utility, which is really cool, you can. So that's probably most of it. Whatever browser you're using though, Edge is really good. We talked about that EFS site. Cover your tracks, default install of Edge passes that thing with flying colors. But if you're running Chrome, Firefox, whatever other browser. Make sure you install the proper extensions to prevent tracking as well, especially Chrome. Strongly recommend Privacy Badger and AdBlock plus, like I said a couple episodes ago, those things work across all those browsers. So that's smart too. So that's most of it. You could exercise, if you will, Edge from your system. I recommend just kind of patting it down a little bit. It's likely over time you will occasionally see something hey, you notice you're not using Edge? Like it may still badge you a little bit. And like I said, Microsoft kind of changes the rules here and there because they really do want you to use Edge. But the way I have this configured right now, honestly, I think would be would be pretty clean. So I'll leave it like this for a little while, see what happens. But I think it's, I think this is going to be pretty good. So if you don't want Edge, that's how you do it. Well, thank you for watching. Hopefully this was useful. We will have a new episode of Hands on Windows every Thursday. You can learn more at Twitter TV H O W thank you for watching. Thank you especially to our Club Twit members. We love you. If you're not a member, please Twit TV Club Twit. Give it a look. Think about supporting the company and all the content creators and appreciate it. Thank you. I'll see you next week.