14 DAY TRIAL // Microsoft’s extension support in Edge browser is already showing signs of success even though this feature is not even publicly available, so only insiders can try it out and run it on preview builds of Windows 10.
But in the latest few weeks, more developers have jumped on the extension bandwagon, and only today two different extension makers have brought their add-ons on Edge.
The new extensions
First of all, there’s Breeze, a rather simple extension whose purpose is to provide users with more control over their new tabs, offering a set of options to configure the new tab page. The extension has also been ported to Chrome, so it’s clearly very important that it arrives on Microsoft Edge browser too.
Then, it’s Instant Translate, an extension that does exactly what its name suggests: it lets you translate text online in a matter of seconds. You can perform text translation in a pop-up window or using a tooltip, but you can also select text and then do the whole thing from the context menu. There’s also a translation history if you want to look back at your previous translations.
Instant Translate is already kind of successful on Google Chrome, so once again, it appears that Edge is one very appealing product for extension developers.
Since extension support is still in its early days, there’s still plenty of work to do in this regard, so Breeze appears to be disabled whenever you close Edge while Instant Translate needs sideloading.
Certainly, by the time extension support lands in Windows 10 stable, which is due to happen with the launch of the Anniversary Update in July, all these problems should be fixed.
Microsoft’s plan was to make Google Chrome extensions extremely easy to port to Windows 10 with little to no modifications to the code, so it looks like Edge is heading in the right direction. Can it steal users from Google Chrome? It certainly can, but Microsoft still has a long way to go before this happens.