The Edge Dev channel gets PDF improvements and Windows 11-inspired changes

If you weren’t already aware, you should know that Microsoft has released build 95.0.1020.0 for the Edge Dev channel yesterday, which brings various PDF improvements as well as small design changes inspired by Windows 11.

This is actually the fourth Edge 95 build to land in the Dev channel, and the developer team said that this major update will soon make its way to the Beta channel.

New build brings important changes to the Edge browser

As far as the Windows 11-style visual updates for the browser go, the team stated that they are still in development and there’s not much to see right now.

So far, we’ve only noticed the redesigned minimize, maximize, and close buttons in the top right corner of the app window, and these three icons are also better aligned vertically.

We also mentioned some PDF improvements being added via this new Edge Dev update. What it does is it brings the ability to pick up where you left off when you reopen your PDF documents in the web browser.

Edge will remember your position in the PDF as well as your previous zoom state and layout, but you can turn off this feature in settings if you don’t like it.

This latest build also lets this beloved browser’s Insiders annotate PDFs with freeform text, and this feature can be used to quickly fill in forms or add visible notes to your PDF documents.

Another notable new feature in this update is the ability to annotate web captures with ink, and we invite you to also check out the blog post for the full list of bug fixes and known issues in this latest Edge 95 build.

Before ending this article, we will list the entire changelog, so that you get to take in the entire picture:

Added features: 

• Features enabled by default: 
  • Windows 11-style visual updates (note that these are still in development). 
  • The ability to annotate PDFs with freeform text.  See https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/articles/add-text-to-your-pdf-documents/m-p/2752561 for more details. 
  • The ability for PDFs to restore what page they were on when they are re-opened. 
  • The ability to annotate web captures with ink. 
• Management policies (note that updates to documentation and administrative templates may not have occurred yet): 
  • Added a policy to control if Intranet File Links are Enabled, which controls if file: URLs located on intranet pages will open File Explorer. 
  • Enabled support for the policy from Chromium to control if Cross Origin Web Assembly Module Sharing is Enabled. 
  • Enabled support for the policy from Chromium to control if the Display Capture Permissions Policy is Enabled. 
• Improved support for opening local files in the browser on iOS. 

Improved reliability: 

• Fixed a crash when using Password Generator. 
• Fixed a crash when using the Web Widget. 
• Fixed a crash when navigating in an IE mode tab. 
• Fixed a crash when using Tab Groups. 
• Fixed a crash when interacting with info bars. 
• Fixed a crash when closing an autofill popup. 
• Mobile: 
  • Fixed a crash on startup. 
  • Fixed a crash when the device orientation changes. 
  • Fixed a crash when signing into the browser. 
  • Fixed a crash on older versions of iOS. 
• Fixed an issue on Mac where checking for updates in Settings sometimes crashes Settings. 
• Fixed an issue where certain applications installed on the device cause all tabs to crash as soon as they’re opened. 
• Fixed a hang when opening Internet Explorer. 
• Fixed a hang when closing the browser. 

Changed behavior: 

• Fixed an issue on certain flavors of Linux where the browser won’t open. 
• Fixed another issue where users are signed out of the browser after updating the browser. 
• Fixed an issue where video volume sometimes gets reset to max. 
• Fixed an issue where Favorites sometimes can’t be clicked. 
• Fixed an issue where importing certain data from other browsers fails. 
• Fixed an issue where Travel Search Assistance doesn’t appear when it should. 
• Fixed an issue where Travel recommendations don’t appear in places they should. 
• Fixed an issue where the Define card sometimes doesn’t disappear when it should. 
• Fixed an issue where certain banner UI can’t be interacted with or closed. 
• Fixed an issue where the link to try the HTTP version of a webpage on the error page that appears when the HTTPS version of the page isn’t available doesn’t actually try navigating to the HTTP version of the website. 
• Fixed an issue where PDF titles as shown in the browser tab are garbled. 
• Fixed an issue where pinned websites sometimes become unpinned after updating the browser. 
• Fixed an issue on older versions of Windows where browser installation fails. 
• Fixed an issue where free text annotation on PDFs doesn’t work at the edges of the page. 
• Fixed an issue where download notifications sometimes aren’t shown in popup windows. 
• Fixed an issue where Jumplist actions are missing from PWAs or websites installed as apps on Windows 11. 
• Mobile: 
  • Fixed an issue where InPrivate sometimes can’t be used. 
  • Fixed an issue where the sign in screen gets stuck when signing into the browser. 
  • Fixed an issue on Android where menus sometimes don’t work when another app is split-screen with the browser. 
  • Fixed an issue where passwords can’t be edited or deleted because nothing on the Passwords Settings page works. 
  • Fixed an issue where Rewards don’t work. 
  • Fixed an issue where the button to enter Immersive Reader sometimes isn’t visible when it should be. 
• Developer: 
  • Fixed an issue in WebView2 applications where certain resources are omitted when published the application (Issue 730, Issue 1061). 
  • Fixed an issue when building WebView2 apps that contain XAML Islands (Issue 1716). 
• Obsoleted the management policy to control if Internet Explorer Integration Testing is Allowed. 

Known issues: 

• Users of certain ad blocking extensions may experience playback errors on YouTube.  As a workaround, temporarily disabling the extension should allow playback to proceed.  See this help article for more details. 
• Some users are still running into an issue where all tabs and extensions immediately crash with a STATUS_INVALID_IMAGE_HASH error.  The most common cause of this error is outdated security or antivirus software from vendors like Symantec, and in those cases, updating that software will fix it. 
• Users of the Kaspersky Internet Suite who have the associated extension installed may sometimes see webpages like Gmail fail to load.  This failure is due to the main Kaspersky software being out of date, and is thus fixed by making sure the latest version is installed. 
• Some users are still seeing favorites get duplicated.  This issue should be reduced now that automatic deduplication has been introduced into Insider channels, but we’re still rolling that out in Stable.  We’ve also seen duplication happen when running the manual deduplicator on multiple machines before either machine has a chance to fully sync its changes, so make sure to leave plenty of time in between runs of the deduplicator. 
• Some users are seeing wobbling behavior when scrolling using trackpad gestures or touchscreens, where scrolling in one dimension also causes the page to subtly scroll back and forth in the other.  Note that this only affects certain websites and seems to be worse on certain devices.  This is most likely related to our ongoing work to bring scrolling back to parity with Edge Legacy’s behavior, so if this behavior is undesirable, you can temporarily turn it off by disabling the edge://flags/#edge-experimental-scrolling flag. 

Are you an Edge Insider? If so, give us your opinion on this latest update in the comments section below.