Improvements to history in Microsoft Edge

Microsoft

Today, we’re excited to share two significant updates to history in Microsoft Edge. We know you have all been eagerly awaiting history sync, and we’re thrilled to announce that we’ve started rolling out support for syncing your browsing history and open tabs across devices. We’re also excited to reveal some improvements we’re making to the way you access your history. We introduced you to a new way of using favorites in Microsoft Edge a few weeks ago, and we’re bringing many of the same enhancements to history as well.

 

As with favorites, the new history experience is designed to help you quickly get back to the sites you’ve visited previously, including tabs you’ve recently closed or have open on other devices. And many of these changes are based directly on the feedback you’ve shared with us.

 

History 1.gif

 

How often do you find the page you want in your history on the first try? Most of the time, there’s some trial and error as you switch back and forth between your history and the various pages to find the right one. The new history experience is designed to simplify this process by opening on top of the current webpage. From here, you can simply click through your history and watch as the page loads in the background. When you find the page you want, simply click anywhere outside of the history menu to close it. Of course, just like favorites, you can also pin history open for a more permanent view as well.

 

History 2.gif

 

In addition to your browsing history, you’ll also find pivots for your recently closed tabs and tabs you have open on other devices. History will even remember which pivot you were on last for faster access next time.

 

We’ve updated recently closed to remember the last 25 tabs and windows from any past session rather than just the previous one, giving you plenty of time to return later. And you can now expand a recently closed window to see all the tabs you had open inside.

 

History 3.gif

 

Support for syncing your browsing history and open tabs is a top-requested feature in Microsoft Edge. This feature is still under development and will be made available to everyone in the future, but users who are already part of the rollout will see a third pivot called Tabs from other devices. Here you’ll find all the tabs you have open in Microsoft Edge on other devices, including Windows, macOS, Linux, iOS, and Android. Note: Both devices need to have history and tab sync enabled for them to show up.

 

In response to your feedback, you can now add history to your toolbar right next to favorites and Collections for one-click access. Just open the history menu, click on the history menu button (Menu Button.png), and select Show history button in toolbar. You can also customize your toolbar on the Appearance page in Settings.

 

History 4.gif

 

The new history menu also includes all your favorite features from the history page, and you can clear your browsing history via the history menu. If you’d prefer a more immersive view of your history, simply select Manage history in the history menu or type edge://history in your address bar.

 

We’d love to hear what you think of the new history experience, so please leave us a comment below or let us know via the feedback tool in Microsoft Edge! These changes are currently available for users in the Canary and Dev channels, although sync may not be enabled in all regions yet. We’re also working on updates to the user experience for downloads and other content types. Stay tuned for more details!

 

William Devereux, Senior Program Manager, Microsoft Edge

87 Replies

I've stumbled upon thread on reddit that shows how to block this new history menu. You need to create shortcut and in target field you can add at the end:

--disable-features=msHistoryHub.

It's not guaranteed to work forever, but for now it's fine on last stable build.
The only issue is that it must be regular shortcut on desktop or sth. If you open Edge from start or have it pinned to taskbar it won't work.

Hope they could add this as a regular setting. Giving back focus to search field is step in good direction but this new menu is still small, and much worse to read and operate than old tab.

I document applications (including Microsoft Edge) for Employees with Disabilities who are using the JAWS Screen Reader.  These constant changes to the interface may be great for sighted users, but we can hardly get documentation published quickly enough to account for your constant changes.  Our users do not use the mouse (only keyboard shortcuts) and are relying on hearing the elements of the screen: they can't just glance at it and incorporate changes holistically.

 

I really hope that the Edge team either gets some accessibility-focused engineers working on the project, or at least allow users to revert to previous structures of browser organization.

@Mixpower  2021 and still not an option to get the full tab-page when doing CTRL + H 😕 
That setting should be a standard or at least be controllable via GPO. 

 

Agree fully with you, we need that setting. 

Unfortunately agreed that this feature feels a little too buggy to have been pushed to stable. It looks like we'll need to wait a few versions for fixes. It must have been fine for Dev / Canary users?

Still having graphical delays / jank as it opens.

Still needing a few clicks for search (which will be launching in 3 weeks on 90, but IMHO, it'd have been nice to incorporate that search into its launch as there is no provided fallback).

I feel for the JAWS Screen Reader users, as well.
I really like the tabs from other devices feature and vertical tabs. This browser is definitely headed in the right direction.

Hey everyone! This is William from the Microsoft Edge team. We know some of you really like using Ctrl+H to open the full page, so we've added a new flag under edge://flags to let you choose whether Ctrl+H opens the new history menu or the full page. This feature is now available in today's Canary build. Look for #edge-history-accelerator-override.

Along those lines, today's Canary also lets you open the full page by clicking on the Favorites/History/Downloads header in the dropdown menu or the pane, saving you a few clicks. See attached for a screenshot.


Please keep the feedback coming! We really appreciate it.

Thanks William Devereux for this great news!
Edge truly is a wonderful browser and goes into the right direction.

@William Devereux 

That's pretty smart move, thank you!

 

I do have a feedback, other people asked for it too, sent many feedbacks for it.

 

why isn't the Pinned state of the flyouts Not remembered?

it's really important, kinda got tired of asking for it honestly since no one listens. I really don't want to have to Pin the favorites/downloads/history/collections Every Single Time to have a sidebar. if i Pin it to make it a sidebar once, i want to see the sidebar next time i open it, until i Unpin it.

 

I don't know why this obvious behavior is neglected.

I currently use sidebars 0% even though i really like them, and that's all because i'm tired of having to Pin the them every time.

So glad you like it!

I can promise you we've definitely heard your feedback. We'll have more to share in the future. I'd love to learn more about why you want it to remember the pinned state though. Is it because you prefer to use the pane 100% of the time? Or do you switch back and forth between the menu and the pane but would prefer it remember the last used state until you're done with it?

@William Devereux 

Yes, the second part, I switch back and forth between the menu and pane but prefer it to remember the last used state until I'm done with it.

 

another thing that's not being remembered is the sort options in collections flyout. when you sort collections or items inside a collections and close then reopen it, all of those sorting is lost.

 

I don't know what's the problem with remembering things when it comes to Edge UI but that's definitely not helping me 😕

@William Devereux is it also possible for microsoft reps to be less cryptic?

What is the build number? 

What is the name of the flag?

@EdgarAstrov 


@EdgarAstrov wrote:

is it also possible for microsoft reps to be less cryptic?

What is the build number? 

What is the name of the flag?


I agree,

please refer to my post here for all the info:

https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/discussions/you-can-now-open-history-page-faster/m-p/2235883

 

 

Thank you.
Sadly it installs additional browser. That is really helpful in enterprise, thank you microsoft. /s
MS are amazing at taking anything that works well and ruin it, and all of that while requesting feedback.

@EdgarAstrov 

Spoiler

@EdgarAstrov wrote:

Thank you.
Sadly it installs additional browser. That is really helpful in enterprise, thank you microsoft. /s
MS are amazing at taking anything that works well and ruin it, and all of that while requesting feedback.


it installs additional browser? i don't understand

Hello again! As many of you know, we recently made it easier to access the full page for favorites, history, and downloads by clicking on the name of the feature in header of the dropdown menu/pane. We also added a new flag to set Ctrl+H to open the history page.

 

Starting with today's Canary build (91.0.851.0), we've added a few additional ways to quickly get to the full page:

  • Ctrl+click on the favorites/history/downloads button in the toolbar or More Menu
  • Click with the mouse scroll wheel on the favorites/history/downloads button in the toolbar
  • Right-click and select "Open <content> page" on the favorites/history/downloads button in the toolbar or More Menu

These are in addition to the existing entry point in the "..." menu of the dropdown menu/pane, as well as typing "edge://<content>" in the address bar.

 

We hope these changes will make it even easier for you to get to the content you care about. Please keep the feedback coming!

Thank you, now there are So many ways to access full page for each of them.

So many mouse ways to access -- CTRL + J still opens the full Downloads page, but CTRL+H only opens the History menu and CTRL+SHIFT+O only opens the Favorites menu.

 

My end users are visually impaired or blind and use screen readers (JAWS) or magnifiers (MAGic and ZoomText). Keyboard shortcuts are essential!  Perhaps y'all could have CTRL+H = History menu and CTRL+SHIFT+H = history TAB?  Since CTRL+O is taken by Open, CTRL+SHIFT+O could be the menu Tab again, and ALT+CTRL+O could be the favorites menu?

 

While I'm wishing, I'd love a consistent shortcut for the "..." (more options) button.  In Edge, ALT+F opens the Settings and More tab, but when there are other items with a "..." button in different screens of Edge (also in Teams), it can be difficult to TAB to it.  perhaps CTRL+COLON could consistently toggle between any "..." buttons?

Need to run Canary build which is separate from edge you get by default. So this is not available for live/production.
Yeah, just gotta wait for the change to come to lower channels like stable 🙂