Microsoft Edge now says Chrome “is so 2008” if you try to download it

Microsoft has arguably gone too far already with forcing its new Edge browser on users by making it harder to switch your default browser on Windows 11, as well as blocking apps that redirect certain Windows links to your favorite browser. But it turns out things can always get worse, as Microsoft’s browser is now actively insulting Google Chrome if you try to download it using Edge. As reported by Neowin, when you open the download page for Chrome in Microsoft Edge Canary, you may now be greeted with a message saying “that browser is so 2008”. The message naturally urges you to keep using Edge, and there’s no obvious way to dismiss it, either.

In fact, there are two different messages you may see, with another one simply saying that Edge runs on the same technology as Chrome “with the added trust of Microsoft”. We weren’t able to get these messages to appear on our end, but you can see them below.

It’s only natural that Microsoft believes its browser is better than the competition, but it could easily be argued that this behavior is user-hostile. Microsoft already tries to prevent users from downloading competing browser if you use Bing to search for any other browser, with a huge chunk of the page taken up by an ad banner for Edge. This extra attempt, in addition to the other controversial moves by Microsoft we mentioned above, seems somewhat desperate. In fairness to Microsoft, Google is also known for heavily advertising its Chrome browser on its own webpages, but it doesn’t go to the same lengths Microsoft has gone to.

At the same time, Microsoft has been bundling features that are unnecessary at best with the Edge browser.  Recently, the company added a “Buy now, pay later” feature to the browser, which could potentially encourage users to spend more money than they have.  This has been the target of significant backlash, and it could end up driving some users away.

We can only hope that these messages are removed from Edge as quickly as possible, but the fact remains that they were pushed to users in the first place when they never should have been.

The post Microsoft Edge now says Chrome “is so 2008” if you try to download it appeared first on xda-developers.

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