How to make Google the default search engine on Microsoft Edge
This is very different from what I did but it also works and is much simpler. If any more have specific questions like you asked this, let me know and I will resolve for you.
How to make Google the default search engine on Microsoft Edge
- by Kyriaki
You have recently upgraded to Windows 10, and are eager to try the new, super-fast browser that comes with the new OS, so you click on Microsoft Edge’s awesome icon and excitedly brace yourself for the best surfing experience currently available. You type a keyword in the search bar, and you can’t quite believe how fast your results appear, until you realise something seems a bit off. Something is wrong, these aren’t your usual search engine results…
Nope, this is Bing! Since Microsoft owns Bing, it is set up as the default search engine for both Edge and Cortana. It’s only expected that they’d try to push their own product, right? However, you might still prefer working with Google, or any other search engine you have gotten used to in the past years. Is there any way to change Edge’s default search engine, or will you go back to using Chrome, Firefox or even Internet Explorer? Well, fortunately, there is, and the process of changing it to whatever you want is not complicated at all.
First of all, assuming you have already opened Edge, you need to point your mouse towards those 3 little dots on the top right of the browser’s window, and click, so that you can access the drop-down menu.
Afterwards, you need to click on the bottom of the list, where it says ‘Settings’, so that you can check how Edge is set up on your machine.
On the ‘Settings’ tab, you will notice there are various sections. You will navigate towards the bottom of the tab, and click on the ‘View Advanced Settings’ button, in order to take a look under Edge’s hood.
On the ‘Advanced Settings’ tab, you will need to scroll down until you reach the option that’s labeled ‘Search in the address bar with’. You will notice that there is a drop-down menu, which is (probably) currently set to ‘Bing (www.bing.com)’. When clicked, it will give you the option to ‘add new’, which brings up another tab, with a few more search engine options to choose from.
Finally, you need to select your preferred search provider from the search providers list, and then click on ‘add as default’. That’s all it takes to configure Edge, so that it will always use your preferred search engine instead of the default, Bing!
However, sometimes your preferred search engine might not appear on this list. This probably means that you haven't visited the search engine’s homepage yet. Edge is able to detect whether a page you visit features the ‘OpenSearch’ standard, and automatically adds it to this list. If you have already navigated to your preferred search engine’s homepage and it is still missing, then it probably doesn’t support OpenSearch yet, which can be an issue. Hopefully, more providers will offer this kind of feature soon, but until they do, you will have to use another search engine on Edge.
As for Cortana, the OS’ personal assistant feature, which also uses Bing by default, unfortunately there is no official method of replacing it with any other search engine at the moment. You could, however, bypass Bing, but the process is a little bit trickier. What you need to do is to download and install Chrome, and set it as your default browser. Then, you’ll be able to download and install third person extensions that force Bing searches to be redirected to another search engine, such as Google or Yahoo. Some extensions that can do this for you are Bing2Google and Chrometana, but there will probably be many more in the upcoming future.
If you still aren’t comfortable changing Edge’s default search engine to your preferred provider, you can always refer to an online step-by-step video tutorial, such as this one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4OeiZIp9FtU
Sources:
http://www.howtogeek.com/221709/how-to-change-your-default-search-engine-in-microsoft-edge/
http://www.tekrevue.com/tip/google-default-search-engine-microsoft-edge/
http://betanews.com/2015/07/29/how-to-change-the-default-search-engine-in-microsoft-edge/
Recent Comments
6
Thanks for this info. I am now into this latest 10 and did lots of tweaking since I transitioned. And will implement the tutorial you shared. No doubt, I am having issues on my search engines.
Appreciate the how to-
Sami