New features in Edge on Windows 10 v1809
Automatic Media Play
There’s nothing more annoying than sites that automatically play media. Many have experienced its horror. So, after hearing a lot of feedback from users, Microsoft has licensed the users to take control of the sites auto-playing media. To configure changes, go to ‘Settings’, choose ‘Advanced’ and under it ‘Media Autoplay’. Here you can find three options: Select the desired option.
Reading without distractions
Now, when you’re browsing a web page in ‘Reading view‘, you can create a summary of it by highlighting a few important lines that help you digest the crux of the issue. To try this out, simply click or tap anywhere on the page, select Learning Tools. Then, navigate to ‘Reading Preferences’ and enable the ‘Line focus’ feature.
Dictionary Support
Similarly, as you read further, you can look up definitions for keywords in Reading View, Books, and PDFs, using the new dictionary function. Simply select any single word to see its definition appear above your selection, even when you’re offline.
Enabling Show definitions inline for
You can select which documents and sites the dictionary should work with by going to the ‘General’ tab under ‘Settings’ and choosing options under ‘Show definitions inline for…’
Redesigned Consent Menu box and streamlined notification
As Microsoft continues to evolve Edge into a superior browser, you’ll find a new streamlined notification appearing when the browser seeks your permission to save password and card information. Similarly, as part of the autofill data features, you’ll be noticing a new consent menu box for saving data.
Changed PDF icon
If you have chosen Edge as the default application for viewing PDF files, you’ll notice a different icon with a red label for PDF documents in File Explorer. All your PDF activities in Microsoft Edge will appear in Timeline. Also, while working with PDF files, you can now bring up the toolbar by simply hovering the top, and you can click the pin button to make the toolbar always visible.
Adjusting Text Size
The ‘Text options’ in ‘Reading View’ adds an option to show wider spacing between letters and change the background color via ‘Page Theme’ to improve readability. To adjust the font size and page theme, click or tap anywhere on the page to display the reading bar and select ‘Text options‘.
Refreshed settings interface
Microsoft Edge settings were getting cluttered with many options available under a single Window. Beginning Windows 10 October 2018 Update, this section will become easier to navigate. Most commonly used actions will be organized into groups with icons for each entry and keyboard shortcuts for faster and quick access. Moreover, there are now new ways to customize the browser toolbar. The much-requested feature – an ability to customize which icons should appear in the Microsoft Edge toolbar has been delivered. You can either add as many as you like or remove them all for getting a clean look in a few simple steps. Just select the ‘Show in toolbar’ option in the ‘Settings and more’ menu to get started.
Refreshed Menus
All your bookmarks, history, downloads, and more will reside under the redesigned Hub menu of Microsoft Edge. To make it visible, simply select the ‘Favourites’ icon by the address bar and give the options (Books, History, or Downloads) a look to see what’s new.
Fluent Design and UI
As more and more changes are discovered in the new version of the browser, few subtle Fluent Design tweaks to the tab bar experience will also become visible. These will add new depth effect to the tabs, currently under view. Although this is second and final big update for Microsoft’s operating system this year, the built-in web browser doesn’t significantly change the way you surf the internet. However, it does add a bunch of new tweaks and several new features designed to improve the overall user experience.
