Unlike the browser Edge introduced three years ago, the new one will no longer use the in-house rendering engine EdgeHTML, but will be based on Google’s Chromium. The report „Windows Central“ and „The Verge“, citing unnamed sources.
The rendering engine of a browser is a program that translates HTML and other components of a website code into the representation on a screen. Chromium is open-source software and is used in Google’s own browser Chrome and in the browsers Vivaldi and Opera. Google’s code dominates, not least because of the many Android devices on which Chrome is the default browser, the global browser market.
The edge browser, on the other hand, has never even reached the market penetration that Microsoft was used to from its predecessor, Internet Explorer. One of the reasons for this is that websites are often optimized for Chromium, which can cause display errors or speed issues in Edge.
For Microsoft, the move would be like confessing to having fallen behind in browser development. Previously, the company had been trying to get Windows users to use Edge instead of Chrome. In the Windows Store, Google was not allowed to offer its browser because Microsoft only allows browsers with the EdgeHTML engine.
Whether the new browser will still be called Edge, what it will look like and whether the reports on the new development are right, is unclear. According to „The Verge“ Microsoft wants to publish this week a corresponding announcement.
