At Microsoft Ignite last week, a slide announced that Microsoft's project to rebase its perennially unloved Edge browser on Google's open source project Chromium is well underway. Release candidates for the new Chromium-based Edge build are available on consumer and server versions of Windows (including Windows 7 and Server 2008, which have already left mainstream support), as well as MacOS, Android, and iOS.

Sharper-eyed attendees also noticed a promise for future Linux support.

How to Install Microsoft Edge on Linux The easiest way to set the dev preview app on your machine is to install its.deb. Rpm package for Debian and similar distros or openSUSE and similar OSes, respectively. Download Microsoft Edge for Linux.

1. Since you’ll be installing Microsoft Edge’s latest Linux client, you will first need to enable Linux on your Chromebook if you haven’t already. To do that, visit your Chromebook’s “Settings” from either the app drawer or the quick settings panel (by clicking on the time in the bottom-right corner of the home screen).
2. 8.1k members in the MicrosoftEdge community. Microsoft Edge, making the web better through more open source collaboration.
3. MICROSOFT EDGE FOR WINDOWS DEVICES 1.1. For installation and use of the Software on any non-Windows platform, including but not limited to macOS and Linux, you may install and use one copy of the Software on any device running such non-Windows platform.

Curious folks can download canary or beta versions of the new Edge for most operating systems from Microsoft Edge Insider—although there's nothing there yet for Linux. Browsing the Edge Insider site from Chrome on Linux replaces the download button with 'Not supported for Linux.' Using Firefox instead presents you with a download button for the Windows 10 version, presumably due to that browser's newly enhanced privacy controls.

We downloaded the Edge beta on a Windows Server 2012 R2 VM and took it for a quick spin. So far, it looks very much like Chrome itself—enough so that you might not notice which browser you're using unless you look very specifically.

For the moment, it doesn't look like there's much to get excited about in Edge's new Chromium flavor—it's pretty much just Chromium with one additional button that lets you go to your Favorites and another smiley-face button that sends feedback to developers. Browsing to chrome://extensions redirects you to edge://extensions and presents you with an offer to head to the Microsoft Store to find some. The profile button, similarly, takes you to a Microsoft login page rather than a Google one.

It seems unlikely that the Linux world is going to go ga-ga for what seems to essentially be a reskinning of Chromium—but that might be missing Microsoft's real thrust here. Many developers—including Linux developers—choose Azure over rival cloud services like Amazon Web Services or Google Cloud, and bringing Edge to Linux may represent little more than a way to offer those developers deeper ties into Microsoft's profile and identity management services.

If a developer already has and uses Azure authentication for work, the ability to tie that authentication directly to the browser itself may be just enough to make Edge interesting.

Listing image by Jim Salter

Use Microsoft Edge for Linux? If so, you may want to rush off and upgrade to the latest dev release.

Why? Well you know why since you read the headline first! 😉

Yes, the latest dev builds of Microsoft Edge for Linux supports sign-in and sync using a Microsoft Account. This feature has been missing since Edge’s Linux debut in the autumn of last year. The lack of bookmark and account info sync is the only thing keeping some users from using Edge as their default browser.

See:

Of course, there is a caveat to this news: you can only sign-in and sync using a personal Microsoft Account (sorry to any AAD users out there). If you don’t already have a Microsoft Account you’ll need to sign up for one first.

Microsoft Sync is enabled by default in Edge version 91.0.838.x and later. If you use an older build you may be able to enable the ‘MSA sign-in’ feature on the edge://flags page.

If you don’t enable the MSA sign in experiment or you’re using an older build you will continue to see the “oh no! platform not supported” message when attempting to sign in:

Once done, just launch Edge, click the account button in the main toolbar, sign in with your details, choose what settings you wish to sync, and away you go. The sync (including settings) works between OSes. You can sync your Edge browser on Windows with your Edge browser on Ubuntu, and so on.

Is Microsoft Edge the best web browser for Linux? That’s subjective and not what this article is addressing. Only you can decide what works for you based on your needs, your outlook, and your ideals. Not that these disclaimers are strictly necessity. Chances are no-one is reading a post about Edge if they’re not not into it 💁🏻‍♂️ — but my point stands: this is news, not a recommendation.

Microsoft Edge Wine Linux

That said, I have pitched my tent in the camp that prefers having a choice to not use something over no choice to use it all.

Microsoft Edge For Linux Download

*cough* Adobe *cough*