Project Spartan, Windows 10's new web browser, has a new name: Microsoft Edge.
Microsoft made the announcement on Wednesday at Build 2015, its annual developers conference.
Microsoft Edge is Internet Explorer's replacement. The minimalistic "chrome-free" web browser is designed to put websites up front and dispense of everything else — including icons and menus that could potentially slow page loads.
Microsoft Edge is "a browser built for doing" with "built-in note taking and sharing" a slide stated. As proof, Edge will support extensions that are designed for Firefox and Chrome with just a few modifications.
Mashable chief correspondent Lance Ulanoff's tested the new web browser in March when it was still called Project Spartan and had only positive things to say. Even though the version he tested was still beta software, he concluded that the web browser was "stable" (he couldn't crash it) and used about the same amount of resources as other web browsers like Google Chrome.
Microsoft Edge is also Microsoft's first web browser to have its voice assistant Cortana directly integrated.
While Cortana will be baked into Windows 10 at a system-wide level, it will work a little differently in Microsoft Edge. For starters, Cortana in Microsoft Edge doesn't talk to you at all. When you type certain keywords into the address bar or select topics on a website, it'll spring into action, serving up relevant information such as the weather, maps and other nuggets in a window pane.
Dumping Internet Explorer is a bold move for Microsoft, but the right one, we believe. Over the years, Internet Explorer has evolved into a slow, outdated and bug-ridden web browser. Although IE 11 is pretty decent, it was too late — most users had already jumped ship to Firefox and Google Chrome.
With Windows 10 and Microsoft Edge, Microsoft finally has a clear strategy for winning back users who turned their backs on Windows 8 and IE.
Microsoft Edge will ship with Windows 10 when it launches later this year.
Microsoft Edge web browser. Goodbye IE, long-live the Edge. #Build2015 pic.twitter.com/PMKVSbnZgV— Lance Ulanoff (@LanceUlanoff) April 29, 2015