Without any doubt, Microsoft Edge is a pretty powerful browser and a great alternative to Google Chrome. It has many excellent features and offers you a smooth browsing experience. However, if this is your first time interacting with the browser, things may seem alien to you. But not to worry, as I have shared some tips to get you started in our Beginner’s Guide to Microsoft Edge on Windows.
Microsoft Edge Tips to Get You Started (Beginner’s Guide)
Here is the list of features to help you start using Microsoft Edge if you are switching from another browser
- Switch To Dark Mode
- Install Chrome Extensions
- Change the Default Search Engine
- Manage Privacy Settings
- Save Web Content in Collections
- Add to Your Favorites
- Enable Sleeping Tabs
- Make Edge Read To You
- Read PDFs and Books Full-Screen
- Reading View
Anyone using an Edge browser should be able to use all of them.
1] Switch To Dark Mode
The dark mode is one of the popular features that every other app has, and the same goes with your Edge browser. Edge browser allows you to change its appearance to dark or any different color combination.
To change the appearance, you have to follow the below steps:
- Launch Microsoft Edge, click on the three dots icon at the top-right, and select Settings.
- From settings, click on the Appearance tab from the left panel.
- Select Dark theme, or select any other theme, and you are done.
2] Install Extensions for Microsoft Edge
You’re mistaken if you think you will miss extensions once you move to Edge from Chrome. Microsoft does support chrome extensions as the Edge browser is built with Chromium. As a result, it supports extensions from Google chrome.
To install an extension, you have to go to the Edge address bar and paste edge://extensions/ and press enter. Next, enable Allow extensions from other stores from the sidebar, and you are done.
Now on the same page, below, you will find an option to install extensions from Chrome Web Store.
3] Change the Default Search Engine
Since Edge was developed by Microsoft, it comes with its company’s search engine Bing by default. However, you may not like bing and want to change the default search engine to Google or any other one.
And you can easily change that by going to Settings >Privacy, search, and services > Address bar and search. Then use the dropdown menu to select Google or any other search engine as per your choice.
4] Manage Privacy Settings in Microsoft Edge
Chromium comes with Google services and tracking. However, Microsoft did remove such services to an extent. Also, Edge introduced a new tracking prevention privacy feature.
As you already know, online tackers collect data about sites you visit and, depending on that. You get to see ads on different sites.
However, the tracking prevention feature prevents that from happening. By default, the quality is set to balanced mode. But you can change it to basic or strict.
To change it, you have to go to Settings >Privacy, search, and services > Toggle on Enhance your security on the web > Finally select between Balanced or Strict.
5] Save Web Content in Collections
Have something to read but don’t have time for it? Then you can add web pages to your collection. Edge allows you to create a collection of web pages, text snippets, and images. As a result, you save web pages to your collection to read later.
To save a webpage, you can follow the below steps:
- First, visit the webpage that you wish to save.
- Right-click on the web page and select Add page to collection > Start a new collection.
The page will now get added to your collection. You can now view your collection by clicking on the collection icon on the top right.
6] Add to Your Favorites
You can store your favorite websites as favorites in Microsoft Edge. Also, it is pretty straightforward to mark any website as your favorite site.
All you have to do is visit the website you wish to add as your favorite. Then click on the start icon in the address bar to make the website a favorite.
7] Enable and Configure Sleeping Tabs
If you work with a lot of tabs, you will love the sleeping tabs feature. As too many things can harm your browsing experience. Hence, you can choose to put some tabs into the sleep mode not to affect your browsing experience.
Using the sleeping tabs feature tells the browser to stop using system resources tabs that are inactive for a specific period.
To enable this feature, you have to go to Settings > System and Performance > Then use the Put inactive tabs to sleep after the specified amount of time option to choose a time frame.
8] Make Edge Read To You
Don’t want to read a web page, PDF, or ebook? Then you make Edge read the page content to you. All you have to do is open up the webpage or PDF, then right-click anywhere on the screen and select the option Read Aloud.
Edge will now start reading the page content. You can also change the voice and reading speed as per your choice.
9] Read PDFs and Books Full-Screen
If you use a browser to read PDFs or ebooks, you can read it on the full screen using Edge. All you have to do is open the PDF file and press F11, and the browser will get into full-screen mode. Similarly, to exit from the fullscreen, you must press the F11 button.
10] Reading View
Often we see websites with a laggy user interface or a layout that is not suitable for reading. In such a case, you can get into the reading view mode. You have to click on the book icon on the address bar, and the web page will switch into the reading view mode.
How to Change Default Browser in Windows?
- Go to the Windows search button, type default apps, and launch it.
- Click on Microsoft edge from the list of the available apps.
- Then click on all the options like HTTP, MHT, WEBP, and others and select Microsoft edge.
That’s it. You have successfully changed your default browser in Windows.
So those were some of the Microsoft Edge tips to get you started with the browser. I hope these tips will be helpful to you. In case there is anything else you wish to ask, do drop a comment below.
