Google Search no longer supports the Internet Explorer 11 web browser, as the company says, “We’ve done the math. It’s time.”
Malta Ubl, software engineer at Google, made the announcement on Twitter, noting that this is good news for the developer community:
As a web developer, this is one of the happiest announcements in a while: Google search ended support for IE11 in its core product 🎉 (you can still search, but you’ll get a rescue experience). I’m mainly posting this for you to send to your boss 😛. We did the math. It’s time.
– Malta Ubl (@cramforce) October 1, 2021
To clarify, “support ended” does not mean that Google will be inaccessible from Internet Explorer.
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Instead, Google will offer a lean version of the search engine that can return basic results but not much else.
“Support Complete” means that none of Google’s new features in the future will be compatible with Internet Explorer.
This is certainly bad news for the 1.32% of the market who use Internet Explorer on their desktops.
However, as the engineer from Google states, it is not justifiable to continue developing features for such a small market segment.
“We’ve done the math” probably refers to an assessment of the resources required to support IE11, versus the potential losses incurred because these users don’t get the full Google experience.
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WordPress made a similar assessment and discontinued support for IE11 with the release of WordPress 5.8 in July.
These decisions are unlikely to have too much of an impact on either business. given that Microsoft itself is ending Internet Explorer in July 2022.
Those who still cling to IE will be forced to adjust to an alternative as soon as possible.
Succeeded by the Microsoft Edge browser, a new version of Internet Explorer has not been released since 2013. Although IE11 has remained integrated into the Windows operating system.
This is coming to an end with Windows 11, which will only ship with Microsoft Edge.
Google is moving away from Internet Explorer, and soon the world will be too.
