Forum Discussion
Introducing the new Extensions menu on the toolbar
Extensions are small applications that enhance the browser’s functionality. Once you install an extension, you can notice the extension icon appearing on the toolbar. If you have several extensions installed on your browser, these extension icons take up considerable space on your toolbar. We have received significant feedback from the users asking for the ability to manage these extensions and reclaim space on the toolbar.
To address this feedback, we are rolling out a new Extensions menu on the toolbar. This extension menu allows you to hide one or more of your extensions from the toolbar. Furthermore, you can directly visit the Edge add-ons site to install more extensions or the extensions management page using the two links provided in the menu.
The extensions menu will be shown to you on the toolbar if you have one or more extensions installed on the browser. The default state of these extensions are shown on the toolbar. You can choose to hide them by clicking on the extensions menu icon and the view/hide icon (eye icon) listed inside. Alternatively, you can right-click on the extensions icon on the toolbar and choose “Hide from toolbar” to hiding that extension from the toolbar.
There are extension-specific “more” options (...) available against each extension inside the extension menu. Try out these options to manage the extension level settings for each extension.
If you would like your extensions upfront on the toolbar, you can also choose to remove the extensions menu from the toolbar. This will ensure that all your extensions are available on the toolbar and the extensions menu icon is hidden from the toolbar. For this, you can right-click on the extensions menu icon and select “Customize toolbar” option. This redirects you to the Appearance section inside the Settings page for Edge. You can toggle the button off or on for the extensions menu to hide or show it on the toolbar.
The feature has been rolled out to the Dev and Canary channels as part of the CFR. Do leave us your valuable feedback around the extensions menu by leaving a comment below or sending us feedback via the browser (… menu > Help and feedback > Send feedback). We hope you enjoy this exciting new feature and look forward to hearing from you!
69 Replies
This is mainly how I have my screen set up. Everything thing else goes to the Ellipses menu.
- This is a terrible change. I keep all my commonly used extensions in the ... menu so I will have more space to have my address bar visible. The only buttons I have visible currently are the Collections Button, and the Share Button.
- Do I like it? Yes. Do I dislike it? Yes.
In the previous menu I could sort and I could have the most used extensions at the top. Now everything is sorted alphabetically and the search for the extension I desire to use is slower for me. Also, the new menu is inconsistent with the History and Favorites menus. Where is the lens to search? Where is the pin button? - @Josh -- The change in how to hide extensions on the toolbar is a huge, enormous, time-sucking fail. I say this because absent this giant step backwards, all the changes your team has made to the functionality of Edge have been helpful and at the least, not harmful (with the possible exception of the early Favorites duplication issue). Please read through the complaints below from longtime users about why the extensions button is a fail compared to previously just hiding extension buttons by clicking the . . . button. As it is, because the new extensions button has yet to roll out to my Edge installation, I now have all my extensions cluttering up my formerly clearn(er) ribbon menu with no way to activate the "Hide from toolbar" button. Seriously, you guys solved a problem here that does not exist. As for needing to know the name of extensions whose icon you don't recognize -- that's what the Extensions button under the menu icon is for. Sheesh, what a mess you've made. I hope you can clean it up soon.
- OK, so I found one solution to my problem. The new Extension toolbar icon "on-off" switch is hidden in the "Settings/Appearance" menu along with other Toolbar buttons. While the Extensions button was rolled out in the latest update, the button never appeared automatically in my toolbar, which made all my extensions suddenly flood my toolbar after the update. I had the inspiration to search for it today and I found it. This makes me wonder why no one on the MS EdgeDev team mentioned this before. *Sigh* Oh, well,
- Spoiler
Dino_Zuma wrote:
OK, so I found one solution to my problem. The new Extension toolbar icon "on-off" switch is hidden in the "Settings/Appearance" menu along with other Toolbar buttons. While the Extensions button was rolled out in the latest update, the button never appeared automatically in my toolbar, which made all my extensions suddenly flood my toolbar after the update. I had the inspiration to search for it today and I found it. This makes me wonder why no one on the MS EdgeDev team mentioned this before. *Sigh* Oh, well,it's not hidden. it is right in appearance settings: edge://settings/appearance
right-clicking on Edge toolbar icons also gives you the option to "customize toolbar" which takes you to the same page.
- At first I wasn't sure about this. I kind of felt like others that it was adding clutter. But, it's grown on me, big time. It may not seem much to some, but not having to move to the menu button actually is awesome. Physical reasons aside (carpal tunnel syndrome), all my extensions are in one confined space. It almost seems awkward now to go to the menu.
Well done, Team MS Edge! I never had an issue with the original system. I didn't want a extra icon so tried hid it, only to be flooded with icons. Took awhile to figure out how to revert the change. "hide from toolbar" being greyed out if the new extensions icon is hidden is very unintuitive. I feel choosing to have the new extensions icon hidden should make extensions function as before, and use the overflow into settings. In the end a feature to reduce clutter has only added and extra icon in my case. Also the new list not only alphabetical, potentially putting someones most used extensions a long way down the list.
- I'm going to join some of the others here - let us hide this like we're able to hide any other button on the menubar. It's great to have a centralized place for this to live, but like all other non-navigation UI it should be an option, not a requirement. Having a right click menu option to "hide from menubar" but then require the puzzle piece be visible is a little confusing - we're trading what used to relegate this to ... to a new menu button we can't get rid of.
Happy to see I'm not the only one who finds this a step backwards. I already sent feedback about this but I'd like to join the crowd here in my finding this "feature" awkward and not very well thought out. Honestly, who didn't know that you can hide extensions simply by dragging the search bar; and if they didn't, why add this instead of just letting them know? In any case, seeing the feedback here (and the reply to my direct feedback) I expect the old functionality to be restored and the extension button to be re-implemented as an optional addition instead of replacement of a perfectly functional feature.
- Before, users could ALSO do `right click > hide in menu`. Edge is simply copying the stupid and feedback-deaf changes that Chrome did.
- So Chrome that's used by millions of people, and has the exact same feature, is backward and bad? right.
- Geeze, Missy, your replies in this whole thread are outright condescending to customers who are upset with the changed UX. Why are you talking down to so many? It's counter-productive and altogether unexpected.
- I'm not a heavy extension user by any means, but the few that I have, I like to keep handy, but out of view. I like a clean toolbar. I keep Favourites, History & Collections on the tool bar because I use them regularly. My extensions, I just want them in the background doing their job. What I don't currently like about the new mini Extensions manager, is that if I turn it off, all extensions appear on the tool bar, with no option to move them to the menu. That option is greyed out - so will it be coming as the feature is developed? Hope so. Conversely, if I turn on the Extensions manager, I can hide the extensions themselves, but I'm forced to have the Extensions button on the tool bar. It's a strong preference of mine to have the choice of what appears on the toolbar (it's MY toolbar, after all). The current iteration of the Extensions manager is ok thinking, but I think that there should be the option to NOT show the Extensions button, AND NOT show the extensions. I know it's one button instead (in my case, 7), but I just want my regular 'go-to' buttons showing on the toolbar.
- If there was room to move extension-buttons to the menu, there is room to move this 'extension-menu' button to the menu. Where it would be hidden from the toolbar, because taking up another slot there just doesn't weight up to the 'benefits' the button has.
To be honest, the idea that having room to show extension name + icon together is a good thing just doesn't register with me. It's not like people are installing 10+ extensions at the same time so they don't know what icon is what.. if a new extension is installed it neatly 'popped up' so you saw what you had done, and you know which icon is which extension.
And like I said, even if this is a thing what people want, the button could be moved to the menu where the extensions were hidden before, and they it can open the list of extensions with names like it does now... just don't be fixed in the toolbar without an option to hide it there.
I still see this move as a _big_ regression.
